Thursday, December 16, 2010

Precept # 1: I Vow Not to kill, but to cherish all life.

So this will be a series of posts that I will do each week as I take each precept into body and mind. I hope to share my experience of working on the precepts towards the process of taking Jukai as a way to strengthen their meaning and to encourage others to look at the precepts as well.

Precept # 1: I Vow Not to kill, but to cherish all life.

Part A: Our Non-feathered Non Vertebrate Friends
So I started working on this last week during the Rohatsu sesshin at Great Vow Zen Monastery. The first way that this precept impacts me is the most obvious. I try whenever possible to directly respect all life which most often comes in the form of respecting insect life. Unless you work on a farm in some other type of business that deals largely with animals insect life is the most commonly encountered of non human life. Though there are birds at the monastery and I have owned pets my relation to insect life seems the most potent. For starters I can easily and with little thought kill most insects I encounter. They are fragile, small in size, and in most cases people think little of someone who kills insects with the exception of perhaps socially favored invertebrates like butterflies or lady bugs. For socially oppressed bugs like roaches and mosquitoes there are various reasons why people encourage their killing on an individual or mass basis. Because of this insects make a good testing ground for seeing if I truly cherish all life.

So this week I took into account how my relationship to my less back boned friends have changed since starting to internalize the precept of non-killing and cherishing all life. The first thing I noticed is that I will now go to fairly great lengths to save a bug. Including using a paper towel to fish one out of the urinals at the monastery. (The urinals here often turn into deadly bug traps.) I also am very careful when walking outside to try and avoid stepping on bugs that cross my path.

The main downside or other side I see to this is that often in my effort to 'save' a bug I accidentally cause it more harm than I might had I just left it alone. The best example of this is I once tried to save a spider (Spider A) by putting it outside, but I accidentally put it into another spiders (Spider B) web. Spider B then went over to attack Spider A. In an effort to break up the fight I instinctively knocked both spiders out of the web. I couldn't find either after that so I'm not sure about whether I helped or hurt them, but it interesting to see that even well meaning acts can go awry.

It's also easy for me to use this as the token example of cherishing life. I can sometimes find myself saying oh well I cherish all life after all I fish bugs out of the urinal. This is the equivalent to saying I'm not a racist because I have friends of color! When I was working with this precept this was at first focus that came into my head, but I knew I had to look at the question more deeply.

Part B: The life of inanimate objects.

Though this perspective of looking at precept had occurred to me before it impacted me in an interesting way this past week. Though some people might argue that inanimate objects don't have life or sentience I still feel that this precept applies to them. Sometimes the first precept is worded by saying all sentient life, but no matter the wording I think that inanimate objects still hold weight with this precept. For man made objects, to respect them is the respect the effort and work that went into creating and maintaining that object. To treat someones craft poorly is to treat them poorly. As for naturally occurring objects whether or not you believe that have a form of sentience that are a resource and part of the network of all life. Lichen need rocks to grow on, dead wood is often home for many animals, and even things like sand or sludge provide the basis for many forms of life. There really isn't anything that exists that I can see doesn't effect life. To cherish these objects or materials is to cherish the ground from which all life springs.

The way this was brought home to me this week had to do with my sandals. We recently got a new shelf to put all our shoes on at the monastery and my shelf is 3 or 4 from the bottom somewhere between stomach or chest height for me. I noticed that early on in the week as I would head to the Zendo for practice or after changing out my work shoes I was dropping my sandals on the ground to put them on. Normally this is something that I would consider quite natural, but I noticed a certain discomfort in my body about this action. As I investigated what it was I noticed that it had something to do with the first precept. My action was not cherishing the life of my sandals. I was literally feeling the disrespect in my body each time I did this. So I began to gently set down my sandals whenever possible, if I forgot my body got that same feeling again. To me this demonstrated that animate inanimate or indeterminate to cherish life is to cherish all aspects of it and a respect for objects as well as individuals grows freely from the ground of this precept.

Part C Everything Is The Life I Cherish
This leads me nicely into the last discovery I made about the first precept. This is that the life I need to respect and cherish the most is my own. All things that I encounter are a reflection of my own life. If I am critical of myself I will be critical of others. If I wish to harm myself I will wish to harm others. To cherish all life is centered in the concept of cherishing my own life. I can't after all cherish anyone's or anything's life for them, but by appreciating that all things flow into and out of my life I can learn to treat all things with the respect my life deserves. Everything I see, hear, taste, touch, smell, or think is part of my life. To cherish every part of it is to be truly present within this blessed gift of a life. By not being present or seeking for things to be other than they are means to kill or devalue this life.

This first precept contains so much within it. It holds both the gross cherishing of life like protecting bugs and animals, but also the subtle cherishing in which all things are a part of my life. I will continue to investigating this precept further and I vow to try to learn to cherish life in a more wholehearted and subtle ways. I vow not to kill, but the cherish all the life that I am blessed with.

Thank you For Reading
Next Week:
I Vow Not Steal, But To Respect The Things Of Others.

Monday, November 29, 2010

Excellent Post On Grief by Mark Pechovnik

This is an excellent post on grief by a wise friend of mine. I highly recommend him and his blog.The link to the actual blog is below.

Mindfulness and Grief
from Portland, Oregon Therapy & Counseling by Mark Pechovnik


Grief is too often regarded as something gone wrong, something to be gotten rid of, something that is too painful to bear up under and should either be avoided or processed through as quickly and thoroughly as possible– and preferably under an anesthetic!

But in a life where everything is constantly changing and everything is bound to, at some point, go away, grief is inevitable.

So we are left with the choice of either rejecting the truth of loss, engaging in thoughts and behaviors that help us avoid the feeling of loss or of accepting loss and honoring it for what it is telling us about ourselves and about life itself.

People who choose to try to avoid grief usually do so unconsciously. They don’t want to hurt so they refuse talk or to even think about who or what has been lost. They will muffle their feelings with drugs or alcohol, compulsive sex, television, non-stop work, or any number of avoidant behaviors that, in turn, shut them off from life and those around them and cause all kinds of personal and interpersonal problems.

Choosing to honor grief requires that we slow down, look inward, note the blockages inside ourselves, and mindfully untangle the knot of emotions surrounding a loss. It requires courage, patience, kindness and resolve.

Most of all, however, it requires love.

We do not grieve what we did not love.

Indeed, when we deeply investigate the feeling of grief that sits inside us, inside our bodies, often in a well just below the heart, we learn that grief is bittersweet. At its core, is a love that knows no bounds and is wounded and maybe even outraged for having come against this irrevocable end.

Grief, in a sense, is the full expression of being human, of knowing what it is to deeply love and to just as deeply know that everything is impermanent.

Impermanence requires grief, and as life is impermanent, we cannot but grieve. However, while grief may hurt, it does not need to cause suffering if we are courageous enough to feel the love that is inside of the grief. (See my post “Pain vs. Suffernig (+pain!))

Mindfully, we watch our emotions, thoughts and behaviors. We notice sorrow, hurt, disappointment, longing … all part of the human experience that cannot be changed.

Next we then turn to our thoughts. We notice our interpretations. We may be telling ourselves, “I’ll never be happy again.” “This is so wrong.” “Unfair!” “It shouldn’t have happened this way.” We ask ourselves if these thoughts increase or decrease our suffering. Consider encouraging thoughts that are less judgmental and more factual, such as, “I miss him.” “I’m so sad and lonely.” “I remember all the good times and I worry about the bad times.” More temperate thoughts will create more space for letting the grief flow.

We then consider how we’re living our lives. We look at our behaviors. Are we engaged in wholesome activities that support our appreciation of life and love of others (the core of our grief, remember) or are we isolating and blaming others and looking to get even with the universe?

What behaviors create more space? What behaviors support us most? If we are courageous, we can reach out to others for support. We talk it over, share our emotions, let ourselves cry, take a mental health day, and let grief process at its own pace.

Just as Autumn can’t be rushed but every leaf turns at its time, so too grief will run its course according to its own need if left unhindered.

In letting grief takes its own pace, we don’t get rid of it sooner, but we increase in capacity and are better able to be more fully engaged in life.

A client once told me that, though her grief didn’t feel good, it felt real … and in feeling real, there was virtue.

Finally, just as life is impermanent, so too is grief. I promise you that, though you may continue to feel pangs of grief over any particular loss for the rest of your life, you will not feel grief all the time. When left unhindered, grief comes and goes just like all things.

Thursday, November 25, 2010

Happy Thanksgiving Short thought

Happy thanksgiving everyone. Years ago pilgrims and native americans sat down for a dinner together afterwards we stole their land and pushed them onto small land dwellings. So remember be thankful for what you have there is no telling when impermanence or a race of space pilgrims will take it away.

SPACE PILGRIMS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Videos Of Weird Buddhist Ritual That will shiver your Spine!!!!

Not really this is a cool ceremony to call in the dark energies of the world and ourselves to acknowledge them and feed them and then to let them go. There is a short intro I edited together at the begging The drum at the beginning are very cool and though this is a pretty esoteric Buddhist ceremony it's interesting to watch. Enjoy!

Segaki Ceremony At Great Vow Zen Monastery. This is a ceremony that ends a month of calling in the hungry ghosts or darker parts of our own nature. He talks about the need to integrate all of ourselves into life and to know the shadow parts of ourselves so we can help ourselves and others.

"The segaki (施餓鬼?, "feeding the hungry ghosts") is a ritual of Japanese Buddhism, traditionally performed to stop the suffering of the gaki, ghosts tormented by insatiable hunger. Today, the ceremony also gives participants an opportunity to remember those who have died and to symbolically sever ties with past sins.

According to legend, the segaki began as a way for Moggallana (Maudgalyayna), on instruction of his master, the Buddha Sakyamuni, to free his mother from gaki-do, the realm of the gaki." -Wikipedia


Segaki Part 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxIF7ETUOHw
Segaki Part 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKU0hPDLKPc
Dharma Talk Abour Segaki http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FBWdTjQbIo

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Right Effort: Following Your Heart

So we had a class this week on Right Effort and it brought a lot of things up for me.

These questions like how long should I meditate for, how do I evaluate the effort I'm putting into practice, how do I know when to push and when to let go more.

These issues are ones that many spiritual practitioners especially those who meditate look at on a regular basis.

Whether you are a lay practitioner or live in a residential training setting or are ordained these questions can become a focus of wisdom or suffering. So I thought I would dedicate a few posts to talking about the issues I have found concerning right effort and some I have heard others talk about.

This first post is about following your heart.

This the common response I've gotten from people when I ask them about right effort. It sounds something like this, " Well no one can tell you how much you should sit you just have to listen to your heart..." On the one hand I agree quite strongly with this notion of intuitive wisdom, but on the other it seems to imply a simplicity that I have found is not always present.

Discerning what the heart is truly telling me can be quite difficult. Before I found practice I listened to my heart quite a bit and it lead me all over the place. On retrospect I believe that in reality I was following a mixture of my mind and my heart, but the fact that one can seem so much like the other is what makes this advice problematic. How do I know when it's my heart or my mind acting like my heart?

There have certainly been times where my heart was very clear about needing to sit a lot of zazen and bring practice into every aspect of my life. It seemed to call me so clearly to the cushion and nothing else seemed to help. I describe this often as sitting out of desperation. It was for me a distinct longing that was only quelled by quieting my mind and throwing myself wholeheartedly into practice. During these time this advice was all I needed.

There have also been times where a haze of confusion has descended over me. Times when I was unsure even why I was practicing. If I looked closely I could still hear that calling, but it seemed like another part of my heart was not buying into the program. When your heart says two things which one do you listen to?

I have found that often faith and even vows to practice have kept me going during these times. There have been nights where my heart ached and I just wanted to go to bed, but I stayed up and sat because I had made a practice vow. I find that often these challenges yield fruit for me. I was able to see through my aversions and confusion just by committing to sit no matter what my heart or mind said to me.

I have also slipped into spiritual athleticism which I know is not right effort. As soon as thought arises that says, I'm going to stay until he/she leaves, I know that some part of pride has slipped into my motivation. Peer pressure can be valuable in one sense but sitting as competition is not the essence of the dharma. Having said that when this does arise I greet it as an opportunity to examine it's roots and I have been able to see beneath by continuing to practice even if my motivations aren't entirely pure at that moment.

I am inspired by the Great Teachers who sat so wholeheartedly committed to practice no matter what arose, but I have a hard time believing they only sat when their hearts told them to. I have a sense they sat for different reasons, but that at some point they sat on faith alone. In most cases doing what my heart calls me to do can stop me from slipping in to critical mind states, but I can also see times where I used this as an excuse for not putting my all into practice.

It seems like this could become such a slipperly slope for any practitioner. Caught up in the evaluation of what the heart is truly saying. For myself I know that I check in with my heart when it comes to practice, but even if I find it empty my faith in my teachers and the Dharma keep me going. I don't know if this is right effort or not, but it continues to be a deep investigation I engage in on a regular basis.

I know that deep within me there is a part of my heart that calls me to see the truth. My heart calls me to seek a way of being compassionate and trying my best to be of service. But often even when I can't hear that call, I keep the faith that it's still there. I have faith that underneath whatever story or thought is clouding my wisdom my heart is calling me to my true home.

Monday, October 11, 2010

CHUKY CHEESE

Do you Love Chucky Cheese or did you Check out this video by the chuky cheese band Rockafire X http://tinyurl.com/realsong1 it's a version of this video Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels) by arcade fire http://tinyurl.com/realsongArcade Thanks to Ben for showing me this coolness

Microswitch reliability tested to 10,000,000 cycles

Microswitch reliability tested to 10,000,000 cycles


If you buy a button online it’s tested to a certain number of clicks
A friend told me this long ago at a party
My parents came to visit recently and when they left
This thought
One about buttons occurred to me
With them how many cycles will I have


The first hug in a long time from each of them click
A look a pride in their eyes click
Her offering to help again and again click
Her indecision and his impatience click
She slowly unfolds an oriyoki cloth click
He jumps up to turn pages for the pianist click
He shuffles in the zendo click
Offering her a blanket because its cold click
Their discomfort but willingness to try almost anything click
Looking for him and knowing I’ll find him working on a computer click
Annoyed but glad that I know him so well click
Driving up the coast for 2 hours and talking about his business click
Listening to him make a subtle pitch so clever click
Talking about dorky grammatical subjects with her in the cutest way click
Stumbling upon a heart walk with him click and joining in for a few blocks click
Looking at guitars which he talk me to play click
Feeling slightly embarrassed by him as strangers to take our picture click and not knowing why click
Listening to her subtle descriptions click
Seeing a look of pride in her eyes when she talks about me click
They laugh at underground tour cheesy jokes click
He groans loudly at the bad ones on cue click
He buys her little horse trinkets at pikes market click
Knowing how much he loves her click and her him click
She talks and people listen click her ideas fresh her eyes bright click
He manages to talk about his business as well click
his eyes lighting with the same spark click
We pull off the interstate 5 times to try and watch a football game click
They came to see my new city click
He takes a picture of a crusty kid with a misspelled sign that says smile if you masterbate click
She buys me two books just cause she wants to click
They tell me about their direct experience of spirituality click
She speaks from her heart about church click
They ask me tough questions but listen to my answers click
The best vegetarian meal he ever had click
She remembers we left food in the room click
He urges early arrival at the airport click
We sit and have coffee before they go click
He gave me a 20 click
She gives me a 20 click
Seeing her eyes tear up as she leaves click
Trying not to cry myself click
Finding it hard not to turn around as I walk away to see them one more time click
Thinking I should move back to Nashville click dinner with them every sunday click
How many more?
click . . . click . . click

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Thursday, August 5, 2010

Learning to Trust the self

To Trust the self is to trust someone who is kind and compassionate and wise.
Roshi told me that when we see these things in ourselves we trust ourselves.
I struggle with this. I wonder sometimes how long this will last.
This current focus of my life.
I want more than anything.
I want the practice to stick.

I have been practicing very hard for 6 months and this week the practice energy fell out from under me like a staged trap door. Since it felt so natural I said I would try to ease off for the week and see how it felt. I am sinking into a depression that I have felt coming for sometime. Doubt bubbling up in me. The  geological movements of habit energy in the tectonic plates of my past.

I know I must find a way to confront these forces and in some ways I'm glad they are showing themselves. Not just in some passing angst but in touching a truly deep place where I feel myself on the brink of vulnerable fears. When I struggle to share my heart I know it's because I am feeling wholeheartedly.

I hope to find the courage to stick this low spell out. I will try to remember my zealous self. My fanatic self who sat yaza and sat solid. I want to practice and I want to serve and I know that if I can see through this I will have confronted an old enemy not for the last but truly for the first time.

I hope to find a way to look at it without taking refuge without hiding. I made a vow to face myself and my fears in practice and now I have that chance. I feel grateful and yet worried at the same time. I hope I can see this through. It is my intention.

May the 3 jewels support me so that I may be of service.
Thank you for all who practice. For it is an expression of deepest faith.

Monday, August 2, 2010

Chasing The Sunset

Taking the plane from Denver to Portland
For over an hour at some godly highly thousands of feet up
we are chasing the sunset.
It appeared like the revealing of a long hidden dream
buried deep within my chest

except as I sit here and write
I say to myself
I don't have any dreams like that
and as soon as the words are thought I know them a lie
I do have one dream at least maybe more
to hold her hand and say I do
to hold her hand and hear it's a . . .
I don't know who she is
hell I don't even know who I am

and maybe that spot on my leg is a rotting cancer
they'll have to cut it off like they cut off my great uncles
his in a farming accident
mine caused by preserved food production
strangely similar circumstance
then who will love me with just one leg
the phantom limb a direct experience of something only psychically real
who will love me with no hair
with no job
with no dream
other than the one dreaming it

and then as the plane sinks
I get that same sinking feeling
like running into wall of water
of having your lungs filled with a lost cause
the sense that I will never find what I'm looking for
and knowing that I should be looking for an end to suffering
rather than a satisfaction of desires that are never sated

I know this and yet
my mind calls
maybe a raft guide
maybe a teacher
maybe a tour guide
maybe maybe maybe

a restless heart
a free spirit
imprisoned by its faradism
this old lure
love love love
has me always hooked
by flight from this to that
I pray I can find the strength
to just be still

Friday, July 16, 2010

The Speed

The speed at which the outside world moves blows me away sometimes.
I just talked with a good old friend and I found myself breathless after the conversation.
This often happen when I interact with the world outside the monastery. It just moves so fast.
I don't think there is anything wrong with it it's just that the pace can be exahusting. It makes me very grateful for how slow things move. So I wrote this about it.

Like a glacier
zen practice will not relent
it slowly forms the earth underneath
on top all you see is calm white
but underneath
over ages and hours of silent sitting
the slowest changes you can't watch
the earth is being formed anew
it is being molded by patient will 
so when the calm white passes
nothing will ever be as it was

Monday, July 12, 2010

To Throw A Party

To throw a party:
bring presence in abundance
bring each moment fresh and new with un-peeled eyes
bring a soft rustle of leaves
bring the maddening love of everything
bring roses with big thorns to adore
bring soft fading moments of sun
bring silence
bring stillness

invite all 10,000 things unnamed
and most of all 
do not invite yourself

Sunday, July 11, 2010

A Mind Full of Eating

So we had a mindful eating retreat this weekend. Another opportunity to look into the depth of experience with food. After several months of eating Ōryōki (a Japanese Style of Formal eating used in Chinese and Japanese Monasteries for hundreds of years) I've gotten used to the style of eating and gained a certain ability to tune out. Which is unfortunate when you consider how much experience in possible in the consumption of food. I relished this opportunity to try relearn old tools to be present with my food.

We did great exercises like putting the spoon down between bites, looking deeply into food where we look at all the people and beings that took part in bringing what we eat, and a great exercise where we see the effect of very small amounts of sugar, salt, chocolate, and hot sauce on memories and emotions.

I personally enjoyed all the wisdom that other people shared about their experiences and as always was amazed at how much suffering food can cause. A thing that everyone needs and so many people don't have enough of causes people a great deal of pain. I got to see the power of what we consume from  food, to energy, to information. A friend of mine who I just met briefly this year talks about it in her blog which I commented on earlier. You can read her blog and what I wrote here. But the jist of it was that there is so much to be said for how we consume so much in this country in the form of energy. Food, fuel, and information.


Chozen Roshi spoke to the fact that ultimately we have a big problem with dissatisfaction. Even though we have way more then we need of certain things she spoke to the essential nutrient so many people are missing. That is spiritual food in any form it takes, but which usually manifests in the act of being present with what is.

A way I approached this in my own practice this weekend was by allowing a fly to land on my body and face without swatting at it. I found that though my mind objected that when I was able to be really present that the experience had a lot of depth to it. I could feel the tiny legs on me and the life that those legs carried. How often have I let a lady bug crawl on me with joy, but with a fly I have only aversion. It is amazing to see how the mind judges and chooses. It also amazes me how to really breakdown all these choices leads to freedom, and yet they happen slowly. As Chozen said it doesn't happen all at once but with small edges of practice that chip away at the low level suffering as well as it's more deep and powerful counter parts.

As I have seen when I stopped seasoning my food there is so much texture and depth to what is there when I am really willing to look and see it. A fellow residents noted tonight that when I came to the monastery I never looked people in the eye and now I fully engage. I was amazed to have him notice this change in me. To me it seems subtle, but  after 6 months of intense practice I feel so much more able to engage in the world.

Every moment has an infinite depth of experience and the struggle to stay present is endlessly challenging. Yet it is always worth it. It's so strange that I used to feel like I needed to watch so much news to feel like I knew what was going on and yet never real paid attention to the 6 inches in front of me. I took those basics for granted. I am seeing more and more that the rustle of leaves in the trees and the real connection you feel in someone's eyes when you engage with them is more real than any news story. To know that is to know what is really going on.

I hope this helps brings some new awareness to your day. And if your interested in mindful eating you should check out the book Mindful Eating by my Teacher Dr Jan Chozen Bays Roshi.

Monday, July 5, 2010

The Fourth is The ForthOf Course Of Course

Well it was a very interesting weekend at the Monastery.
This was the first weekend for our many new summer residents. We have a group of 15 or so new people who will be living with us for the next month. It's great to have to influx of new energy and it's fascinating to watch people adjusting to this different way of life. You tend to forget how living this way can be so challenging. They are all very eager but you can see the first week of early waking and long sitting effecting them. A couple of quotes that made me realize how much of a alien planet a zen monastery can be.

1. I just want to thank you guys for being normal (This was said to me and to another resident. No one has ever thanked me or her for being normal.)

2. We get to sleep in til 6:50 tomorrow and no Zazen * WOW! Really! That's Awesome!
*Zazen is seated meditation practice (The fact that 6:50 is an amazingly late time to sleep in speaks for itself)

We were also involved in a 4th of July Extravaganza. Many of us participated in different floats. I participated in the Quincy Crash Band. A jam band made up of monastery residents covered in glitter and followed by residents dressed as fairies, a couple who were on skates. It was indeed quite the spectacle and I will try to get pictures. We did jams around the themes of funk, rock, ska, and reggae. I played guitar on the funk and rock parts and did poi on the others. It was a ton of fun and its very different then they way folks from the monastery interact with the local populace.

The whole time spent in Clatskanie was very interesting. It was really cool to see such small town America out to celebrate the Fourth of July. They had a fair with a lumberjack competition, bingo, funnel cake, and carnival rides. I spent most of the time playing bingo, watching the dunking booth and talking to my folks. I wanted to get a funnel cake, but the line was 40 mins long and that seemed like too much effort just to eat something that I shouldn't.

Later we grilled at the Monastery veggie dogs brats and burgers and loads of potato salad. Then we played ultimate frisbee and some wizard. We ended off the whole thing by driving back into town to watch the fireworks. All in all it was really fun day for all involved.

But of course the Dharma is always speaking so here's what I took away from it.
First my favorite quotes of the day.

1. Hogen (One of the Zen Teachers at Great Vow):
"Sam sit down play some Bingo for the Kiwannis Club"
Chozen (The other Zen Teacher at Great Vow (After I had gotten my bingo cards)):
"You know the Buddha Forbids gambling"

2. Chozen: There are two things you should never run out of. Blankets and fireworks.

3. (As we are setting up some fireworks to shoot off)
Sam: "I remember safety first."
Chozen: "No. . . fireworks first."

Next what the Dharma taught me.

1.People are trying to end there suffering in anything they can do including causing others to suffer. I observed this at the dunking booth. And don't get me wrong I love a dunking booth but the premise under it is interesting. Have fun by causing someone else to suffer in cold water. Though no one really is getting hurt the idea behind this is the basis for the continuation of suffering in our world. It really shows me that people endeavor to end there suffering and that a common unskillful way to do that is by hurting others. There is a biological reason for this and it does satisfy that craving, but I really wonder why we are set up like that.

2. Children do most things wholeheartedly. I watched these kids competing in the lumberjack competition. They were just going full out. If there's one thing I wish I could relearn or not have forgotten its how to be that wholehearted. I think it's because we realize how much it hurts to fail when we really try so we stop trying so hard. The thing is that hurts even more. There is a beauty and a cleansing that can happen with wholehearted effort.

3. We spent some time with some sangha members dog who is dying. She can't really move and has to be carried around. She was a sweet dog and it was beautiful to have so many people around her sending her loving kindness. But the look in her eyes made me realize the universality of dying and that bitter sweetness that comes with it. We will all have to face that great mystery at some point. But so will every other living thing that we know of. The look in her eyes reminded me of how in death we participate in this great transition with all things. In some ways its the ultimate expression of our very nature of impermanence. And reflects so much about life itself in it's sublime sadness.

Well thats all for now. I hope everyone had a good Fourth and Keep your eyes peeled for some good pics coming later.

As always Gassho and Namaste!

Monday, June 28, 2010

Sesshin On Loving Kindness

Often in Zen practice I feel like I am shadow boxing my own mind. Which can be particularly challenging. It after all isn't really a fair fight. My mind has been paying attention to me for many years. Cataloging likes and dislikes temptations and things that drive me well ape feces throwing crazy. I on the other hand has just started paying attention to my mind. I am reminded of how fierce an opponent it is to battle with every time I sit sesshin. Which involves being still and trying to concentrate for 50 mins segments for at least 8 hours a day and then keeping the mind still through various other activities. As I watch it's zigs and zags and I feel like Ali except I'm never really sure the rope a dope is working.

I spent the week sending Metta or loving kindness to myself, friends, family members, to immune system reacting with allergies, to ex-employers and old girl friends. This involves sending energetic loving kindness or by focusing on phrases like May I/they be free from fear and anxiety. May I/they be at ease. May I/they be happy. So if any of you felt a sudden surge of good energy maybe it came from the depths of my quiet mind. It could also just be that caffeine hitting your system, but the Buddha did say that Karma was a tangled web.

So I spent the week sending loving messages and what does my mind do?? It sends me pain. Leg pain, back pain, nose pain, emotional pain, and maybe worst of all the pain of a coke commercial from a long time ago which I rewrote a bit.
o/` I'd like to teach the word to sit in perfect serenity o/`

But I know that my mind has good intentions. Like my immune system my mind is reacting to the pollen of my Buddha or enlightened nature. It is trying to protect me from something is not actually a threat. It is showing it's own loving kindness.

Pain is after all of at least two benefits to me. First it keeps me from catching on fire or at least staying on fire without my knowledge. Secondly it teaches me that I am growing little by little. As much as we romanticize growth and change it is very often painful. My pain physical, emotional, and spiritual represent the fact that I am pushing myself to my edges. While pain for the sake of pain is not the intended goal it can certainly be an indicator of progress.

I also discovered how critical my mind can truly be. We were asked to do metta for ourselves and others whenever criticism arose. I found that my mind is often generating critical thoughts. Though I don't believe the stories it tells me about others faults at least for the most part. I do wish that I could sustain a more loving attitude towards others and I know this critical voice isn't really helpful in that endeavor. So while I found myself doing A LOT of metta for others and for this critical voice. I also found it shortened the length of the criticism and increased the amount of compassion I felt for them in the moment.

The work I did this week has been hard but I am glad to have more tools in my practice kit. I think metta practice is a very interesting mix to add to our daily lives and I intend to put it to better use from now on. I particularly glad to have a specific antidote for those criticism that arise about other people.

So May you be free from fear and anxiety, may you be at peace, and may you be happy!