ScurrilousMonk

variations on a theme

2011-12-08T17:17:00.003-06:00

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catching a moment
in flowery language
poets are liars

Passages

2011-03-20T03:26:00.001-05:00

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A cherry petal floats down
on a warm spring breeze
morning breaks the brand new day

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On Bowing at strange altars

2011-02-20T23:18:00.002-06:00

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Whether we know it or not,
All altars are created out of the same need.

Whether we know it or not,
All altars express the same desire.

Whether we know it or not,
All altars ask the same question.

Whether we know it or not,
All altars honor the same mystery.

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On Bullying

2010-10-21T11:58:00.001-05:00

Sometimes I wonder how those who depend on the school system to protect them and their children are going to survive in the world when the kids get out of school. There is no shortage of those who will pick on the weak and vulnerable anywhere.

Either you teach your children how to deal with bullies or leave them vulnerable, there are always bullies and will always be bullies. If I remember my misspent youth correctly, it was not that difficult to outsmart most bullies and a little self defense skill went a long way when all else failed.

The system cannot and will not protect you. Wake up and learn to protect yourself.

It is your mind, do not let it be influenced by inferior minds. Cyber bullying is pretend bullying. Just click close and they are gone. see rule one below. A threat on email or in a text is a like a threatening phone call: report it to those who can deal with it appropriately.

The way I was taught was:

1: avoid a bully if you can. Outsmart, out last, out run. Find a safe place when possible. If someone does something illegal, use legal remedies.

2: fight if you have to, but only if you have to.

3: fight to win if you have to fight, because you do not have to win, but you have to make them respect you or you will be a victim the rest of your life.

4: Protect your brothers and sisters (everyone) from those who are bigger than they are. Stand up for those who are picked on when you can. This includes helping them avoid difficulty when it can be avoided.(see rule one).Be a safe place for others when you can.

corollary 1: learn to defend yourself to the best of your ability before you need to because you are going to need to. Besides people who seem confident of their ability to defend themselves do not find themselves victimized nearly so often as people who appear more vulnerable. Most bullies pick the easiest targets. Just do not be the easiest target.

corollary 2: If you are going to die anyway it is better to go down fighting and make the aggressor pay what you can than to slink off and kill yourself or your teacher because you feel helpless and picked on and powerless.

There are times to be the peace you desire, and times to fight like hell for a life worth living. If you are left feeling like the only option is to kill yourself, the time to fight has long passed.

It is not a kindness to leave our children feeling helpless,picked on and powerless. We are the adults, it is our job to see our children are not left with no option but to be victimized.

Variations on a theme (poems in praise of fat bottomed girls)

2010-05-13T10:56:00.003-05:00

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"the dancer"

when she takes one step
long the sweet half seconds be
while her ass takes three

"an ass man's lament"

life is so unfair
she can win the argument
by stomping away

"an ass man's lament #2"

poor sad old Japan
after three months of searching
not one decent ass

"there is no chivalry"

we open the door
so we can look at her ass
as it jiggles by

"tough choices"

I may choose to stay
so I can watch her her bottom
as she walks away

"life lesson"

it's best to bunk with
a woman who has stuff to
fill up her trunk with

kinhin (a blissful distraction)

Walk the zendo round
following her bouncing butt
a perfect moment

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Re: Brad Warner's post: MAD Non-Conformists and More Bitching About Internet Zen

2010-05-07T11:15:00.001-05:00

I would have liked to have seen how your teacher would have reacted to being clicked off when you did not like his response. Not to mention it is hard to pretend to be something you are not while sitting in a room together all day. Pretending you are something you are not is easy on the internet. If you are fooling yourself as to how great you are it is nearly impossible to do that for a whole day in a room together, yet it can go on for years on the internet where relief is just a click away. Which is why many internet zen people never set foot in a real zendo as their being a legend in their own mind would be over in a few minutes. .

In real life your ears have to burn long enough to get your shoes on and boogy your ass out the door.This is an experience one tends to remember. On the internet one can click off and be out of there in a split second, and never look back.

Recently I got invited by an internet group to submit a lecture on a precept for them to study as they were returning to the basic teachings of Zen. They told of all the wonderful teachers that would be taking their turn with me as if this showed how honored I should be that they asked me. This is a group that had previously moderated my posts because they did not like what I had to say, or more specifically my using words like shit and bull crap which went against their understanding of right speech. Evidently I was not nice enough for them back then but they still wanted a lecture now, go figure .

I responded to their request by saying that I had not thought about the precepts in years and yet another reading of someone else's wisdom about the precepts had nothing to do with the basic teachings of zen as I had been taught. I mean come on.. If one googled the precepts one probably could spend the rest of one's life reading about what people thought about them, and would never have to survive a single moment of actually living them. Another lecture on the precepts is probably as needed as another oil spill in the gulf. If one has to take the time to think about how they should respond according to the precepts they are lost before they start.

My teacher does not lecture on the precepts, once in a great while he will read one of his teacher's lectures to an intro group. For those of us who practice with him he demonstrates how to live in the precepts by how he gets up in the morning, how he eats, how he sleeps, how he chops wood and how he rolls up his sleeves and carries the shit bucket from the latrines down the mountain to spread on the temple garden before heading up to the Buddha Hall to lead noon service. Not one of these essential teachings could be gotten from the internet. There is something about holding up one end of a pole bearing a shit bucket that requires one to really completely step in harmony with the Buddha on the other end. Either you learn to do it or you get shit on your shoes and probably the Buddha's as well. This was for me the essential teaching of Zen. To bad some miss this kind of experience. I know I would not trade a minute of it for years of typing questions and reading answers on the internet.

Sure an Internet practice is an easy way to practice, but I was taught not to seek an easy practice. Nothing ventured nothing gained.

All your points were great in this post. Here is my bitch about the same topic.

Good Friday message to a Christian who does not like his religion being suppressed::

2010-04-02T10:46:00.003-05:00

"Now when Jesus heard these things, he said unto him, Yet lackest thou one thing: sell all that thou hast, and distribute unto the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, follow me."

"Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.'

"They also will answer, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?'

"He will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.'

The Republicans did not take care of Jesus' health care needs.

They were in power for eight years and ignored his illness. Not one voted to get their lord his needed tests or surgery. Not one voted to give him what he needed to live another day, but they love him more than anything except their house or their car, and by God they are not going to pay higher taxes to see that Jesus does not die from illness.

They voted to have someone else give their elderly Lord some medicine sometimes and did not vote any money to do so. They voted to have our children pay for Jesus's medicine. They voted to cut their own taxes to make sure they would not have to pay for it.

They thought he would not deserve to live because he could not afford healthcare. It is just the market, not their doing.

When Christians live their religion I respect them. When they do not, I do not. Put up or shut up. I get so sick of "Christians" worrying about others sinful behavior and not looking at their own.... I think Jesus said something about that as well....something about a mote in another's eye and a log in your own.

Have a great" My Lord has died" day. You kill him everyday with your policies and practices. For those on the right, everyday is Good Friday.

Please by all means, become a follower of Christ. I will love you for it.

Fudo's blessing

2010-03-13T13:49:00.003-06:00

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May you see your self reflected in a smile,
hear your self reflected in a laugh,
and find yourself in someone's arms.

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the night storm companion

2009-08-25T05:34:00.011-05:00

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its midnight blackness is almost dark enough to match the mood

falling rain raindrops are almost enough to mask the tears

the flashing of lightning and the crashing of thunder mock the need to lash out at anything that moves

the cool breeze that almost relieves the red heat of rage carries the bittersweet memories of other lights that have vanished into the night

the thunderstorm dwindles to a fresh smell that is almost the fickle promise of a new day

The white heat of raging thought reflected in a single tear is not enough to stem the black velvet tide that engulfs all desire

the passing storm is only a brief familiar comfort allowing a slight catch of breath before the rising of the mourning sun

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A funeral talk.

2009-05-02T19:43:00.000-05:00

It is in times like these we stop to contemplate the great matter of life and death. Everything that is born also dies. As we say in my tradition right there in birth is death. When life is created, that life's eventual end is also created, when a relationship with another person is begun, its end is also created. All of us hope that between the beginning and the end there will a full life to fulfill the promise of the potentials that arise with each new thing.

The old masters of Buddhism sometimes ask the Koan (puzzle) what was your face before your parents were born? In the eastern cultures “face” does not mean just your eyes nose and mouth, it means the essence of who you are, including concepts of honor, bravery, honesty, attitude, and all the sorts of traits that go into making up what we think of as a person. Inherent in this question is the idea that who you are is beginning to be shaped before your parents are born. In our time and place we even say we want to know about our ancestry to get to know how we came to be who and where we are. It is not a great leap to move from “what was your face before your parents were born?” to what of your life carries on after our life here on earth comes to an end? A more modern way of saying this is that people live on in the legacy they leave. Those forces that started to shape our world and ourselves that began before our parents were born continue on after our grandchildren create our great grandchildren. The things that really matter about our lives, what we do in this world, have seeds that exist before our birth and flowers that bloom long after our death.

When I was reading the nice words Maj wrote about her mother Marian loving and tending flowers, it took me back to memories of my mother and her love of flowers and how she passed on that love to me, patiently teaching me about the smell of the clover, and the brown pollen one can get all over themselves from tiger lilies. We worked in the garden growing flowers and vegetables that never seemed to be allowed to grow to their full potential before children's hands picked them. Part of Saturday morning before I sat down to write this I spent teaching my Grandchildren about violets and tulips and dandelions. I am sure when my mother shared with me her love of flowers and nature, she was not thinking about the fact that years after her death, that love would be passed on to yet another generation, and that part of her that was this love would live on to brighten the lives of descendants she would not live to know. To this day I cannot see a clover without recalling my mother laying on the grass looking for another of the four leaf clovers she used to find so frequently in the lawn, and that eluded me in many hours of childhood searching of that same patch of lawn. Perhaps not all of my mother is to be found in a patch of clover, but you will never convince me that part of her is is not there as surely as part of her looks back at me in my grandchild's eyes.

I read once in some place or another.(like Marian I am a voracious reader) that there is in each of us an atom that was once in ever other human being that ever lived. This idea stuck in my head as I was at the time learning to see that not as much as I thought separated me from every other person. It sort of helped me to be more generous in my thoughts when I realized that part of what had been me was in every person I met, and would meet. Maybe at a time like this, it would help to begin to look for the atom of what was Marian in each person we meet.

The reality of my Mother was not all flowers and love however, and sometimes some parts of her legacy were not as pleasant for me to deal with. There was the part that was easily hurt, and quick to remember each slight. The part that would often recall for any who would listen each thing anyone else had ever done wrong. This is a part of my mother's legacy I do not wish to pass, and bless her heart, my mother would not wish to have passed on. Part of my life's work is to work with this legacy and heal the broken parts, and spread the parts that are whole and healing. I sort of feel I am healing my mother as I heal myself.

It occurs to me that in this way my mother is still growing and changing as each of us who were touched by her life grow and change. I am quite sure the same is true of Marian as well.

As I grow older and I begin to understand the answer to what my face was before my parents were born I find the more important question becomes “What will be your face after your great grandchildren die?”

Just like we have no control over the circumstances of our Grandparent's birth we really have no control over what happens after we leave this life. What we can control is what we do in this life. All of us are planting seeds whether we know it or not. Seeds that will flower sometimes long after we are gone. The truth is all we can do is plant the best we can, and hope that seeds grow on fertile ground.

do not seek an easy practice

2007-06-07T22:39:00.000-05:00

Dear Readers,

I am going to have to ask some of you who have been around for a while to forgive me for repeating myself again and again...but I think it is time for another crack at post number 3. (sometimes I feel there are maybe five posts I just write over andover.....(1: get a teacher 2: yes you really need to bring this into your real life...and on and on a few more numbers.)

We seem to think there is a shortcut...that all we need do is to think the right thoughts, see the right things or even feel the right things......and poof.....so if we read enough books by Thich Nat Hanh or the Dalai Lama then we can be just like them. But Thich Nat Hanh's practice was tempered in a real war zone with grenades and bullets, and the Dalai Lama was driven from his country that he was responsible for and watched those friends under his protection tortured and killed.

Those who pretend to walk around as holy as the Dalai Lama and have not had their practice tested as deep and as hard have no idea whether or not they could respond like he or Thay did to their life practice. The fact is ....none of us knows what will hold up when push comes to
shove...we can only hope we will have the strength to stand as these men have. They have what some of us call "street cred"(cred is short for credibility)......they have proved themselves in the toughest going......and we simply have not. Even though what the Dalai Lama faces in his daily life now seems like a piece of cake compared to what happened earlier...it only seems so relatively. Without the hard stuff that went before...this is still the hardest thing we know....and if the hardest thing we know is living in the richest (or one of the richest) countries in the world ...then that is really not so hard after all.....no wonder it seems difficult to have to deal with a flat tire in rush hour...it is the worst thing to happen to us in ages.

When we have a practice that does not work even in the mildest of conditions to keep us on a stable footing on the path......then we lack "street cred".

The native American elder who I used to work with always says "If your religion does not grow corn...then it is useless". If when you are depressed and looking at that bottle of wine...or when your friends are over and you have a hard time saying no...and you wind up drunk on the
floor and in some trouble...then you lack the "street cred"....your religion does not work for you when the going gets rough...and what you are offering to others is a fraud. The problem is ...the only way to know if your way works when the going gets tough is to actually practice in some tough places. This does not mean that we need to deliberately seek out difficult things....life has a way of handing us difficult things to deal with even in the nicest of places. What we need to
understand though......is when we talk about how abused we were as a child..........we are not going to have much street cred with some 12 year old girl who has had her clitoris cut off and has been a sex slave for 6 years already in some third world country....so we have to also
take a look at our credibility when we speak. We have to gain an understanding about the depth of our own practice and seek our own level and not try to preach to those who will not believe we have any credibility to speak to them.

The thing is......the more we have suffered, the more credibility we have when we talk about how to relieve suffering. The Dalai Lama and Thich Nat Hanh have a whole lot of street cred.....almost anyone wants to have the results of their practice....but no one wants to have to go through what they did to get it.....the problem is ....you cannot borrow someone else's credibility ...it is not yours to share or offer....you can only offer your own....and if what you have does not work in a warm apartment on a gloomy day....it does not have much credibility to a pregnant child in a planned parenthood clinic....no matter if you borrowed one of Thay's books to hand out ....or the latest wisdom from the Dalai Lama. I doubt even Thay would hand out one of his books in that situation ...even though he has more right to do so than we do.....he would probably sit down and hold a hand and stay till no one needed to hold a hand any longer. If he said anything it would probably be words of comfort....spoken in his own words directly to the heart of the person who's hand he holds.

So .......when push comes to shove ...and we are calm...and able to pass through it without getting stuck....then we gain a little credibility....and we then can help others through that particular situation.....because it is not the way that fails if we cannot ...it is
us.....and no matter how well we negotiated the last trial...we still have no idea how well we will negotiate the next one....and we must, if we wish to lead others through it...inspire confidence in those we wish to lead. I do have faith through my practice that this way works in some
pretty tough times..........so...if you want one way that works......this is one.

I have had too good karma to have passed a test in a battle...or to have starved in a third world country.....I cannot really speak to post traumatic stress syndrome, or slavery, or even imprisonment. (though in my naivety I have tried in the past). This stuff we end up dealing with
here is basically a kindergarten practice.....I do not aspire to be the Dalai Lama because I do not wish to be tested as deep and hard as he was....I am fine with being a kindergarten teacher. I will never be great as these men because my karma is too good......a thing I am thankful for every day.

I was raised in a violent and abusive family situation...my father drank all the time and beat my mother almost as frequently; we were physically abused. Yet I lived in a free country in a warm house, with clothes to wear and an education for free within walking distance ........Compared to some in the world....this would have been the best childhood they could imagine.

It is not a surprise to me that compared to Thich Nat Hanh...I lack a little street cred.........to some it seems a surprise to them that they do.

So...I do not care what you think ....I only care if you can walk your path through a little difficulty.....because compared to some..if you have a computer and access to electricity your difficulty is going to be little compared to theirs. If you cannot handle an email list, you
cannot handle life, and if you cannot handle life, you have no business in other people's business. So now you "have seen the light"......how about you go about and get a little street cred before you try and thrill an audience that has seen the same show before....before you comeon here and try to sound like the Dalai Lama ...how about you demonstrate a little bit of his actual practice?....otherwise you come off as an actor playing a part.......like a con....a liar.......dishonest. If you do not talk about moon being moon with your homies...do not put it on here for us....it just sounds fake because it is.

If all you can really talk about is how you could stub your toe and continue walking the path...then talk about that...and those who might stub their toes will benefit.....and you will have the benefit of sounding and being authentically what you are.

No..... I do not sound like a Japanese Zen master....I do not talk like the Dalai Lama...nor Thich Nat Hanh.......I never will........if you are looking for that....go someplace else...if you feel that is lacking here fine...but if you are going to say something say something honest...do
not borrow Thay's wisdom or the words of the Dalai Lama. Perhaps it would be better if you go off and develop a practice as tried and tested as Thay's and then bring your own wisdom here.....then we would honor it.........In case you have not noticed......we only pick on those who
try and come off like the Dalai Lama is their younger spiritual sibling after they have had a whole five minutes of insight, and little or no actual practice.

Interesting isn't it? Thich Nat Hanh had a teacher..the Dalai Lama had a teacher, Dogen, Bodhidarma, Nagarajuna and Ananda had a teacher....the Sixth Patriarch had a teacher....and for those in the know (a little esoteric secret here) even Shakyamuni had a teacher....he is the Sixth
name on my lineage chart....not the first.....seems a little bit....well ....arrogant to think we can get it by reading a book and pondering a bit on our own doesn't it?

All right...this got longer than I had planned it to....and maybe a bit of post #1 and post #2 got worked in there as well.....but I guess it is what it is. It took pretty much all my free time today to get this whipped into some sort of shape....the grandson was needy today.......what an honor to be the one who can offer comfort in a time of difficulty.....makes passing through a bit of difficulty yourself seem like a small price to pay.

Be Well

Fudo

a little brad warner

2007-06-01T23:10:00.000-05:00

Here is a quote from an article by Brad Warner on the common ground
website. http://commongroundmag.com/2007/06/tunein0706.html for the
full article.

"
"Nobody's tricked you, you moron," they'd say. "You know what the
truth is. Stop being such a bonehead, and take an honest look at
yourself." Gensa didn't need a Learned Zen Master to tell him he was
in pain when he stubbed his toe that day. And you don't need anyone to
tell you what your life really is either. You sure as heck don't need
me. I cannot possibly tell you anything you don't already know. You
probably agree, since, if you're like most people, you think I'm an
idiot. But you probably also think that somewhere out there in the
land where books are written is someone way cooler and tons more
spiritually advanced than me who can tell you something you don't
already know. Keep right on looking. The publishing industry loves you."

Brad is recounting the tale of Gensa, a monk who gets all upset and is
ready to leave the fricking temple when he stubs his toe on the way
out the gate....and finally understands that he has been deluding
himself that his body is just an illusion, and there is only one who
can delude him...and he will no longer be able to do that anymore.

I just thought I might share this ...for those of you who think the
word moron is not something a Zen priest should say....That no kind of
Buddhist monk would talk like I do.....not only does Brad say it....he
says his teacher's said it to him.

Maybe some of us can fool ourselves into thinking that all Buddhist
monks are sweet and tender, loving teachers who wrap their arms
tenderly around everyone who shows up at the gate.....Here is just a
little point to who is really deluding who.

Many people come here and think that because they fool themeselves,
they can fool me, and all the rest of the rest of the list.

All I ask is that you come here in honesty...and do not ask questions
intended to decieve, muddy the water, or keep yourself in your
delusion because you can delude yourself into thinking you can blame
someone or something else for your misery.

Do not come here and ask questions like "If a man has no teacher, no
sangha, and by chance wakes up, is it not right that he should seek
confirmation from the sources available to him?" ...who exactly do you
think you are fooling? No one really honestly talks like that. The
language is designed to deceive.

Being real and honest.....that is one mark. "I just can't be deceived
by others." and the corollary....I no longer wish to decieve myself
nor others.

Sorry...but anyone with a true awakening would run not walk to the
nearest person who might be able to confirm, and present themselves as
honestly and fully as they could. The internet would leave too much
room for even accidental deception. It could never be sufficent. So
then answer is in the question. A man who by chance wakes up..would
not be without teacher nor sangha for long. Ergo....no teacher no
sangha...no demonstration of awakening...ergo no realized awakening
(awakening made real...realization). All that has been demonstrated by
chance is a dream of realization...and the dream is not enough.

Perhaps we might look to the Sixth patriarch...who awakened (perhaps
by chance) to a monk's chanting of the Diamond sutra. He left as soon
as he could to find a teacher and a temple to practice in. When he was
not found suitible to practice with the real monks...he cut bamboo in
the garden just to be near the teacher and the temple, when it came
time to pick the teacher's successor....it was his poem that won the
robe...and he had to sneak off in the dark so as not to cause the
"real monks" to murder him in their jealousy. Even so they gave chase
and could not find him. In the story there is never a hint that there
is something wrong with the system......the sixth patriarch could not
be deceived. His teacher could not be deceived...certainly not by others.

Be Well

Fudo

something little you could do

2007-02-14T08:56:00.000-06:00

For those of us who are frustrated and angry with our government for some of the things that have been
going...or for Washington as a whole........a congress that debates instead of acts....a president who does
not feel the need to lead....those of us who feel disenfranchised and unheard I propose a way to be heard.

Let us do a little thing. Let us go to the funeral of those who live in our town, or near our town who are killed
in the undeclared war in Iraq, let us go to the funeral of anyone killed in the war on terror that we are able to
attend....the government and the media are not interested in us seeing the flag draped caskets. Perhaps...if say a
hundred or so too many to get into the church show up at a funeral..there will at least be local coverage of the event.
If more manage to show up......so much the better......but what would be the effect on our senators and representatives
if they had to hold soldier's funerals in sports stadiums and hire off duty police to direct traffic?...if downtown got
shutdown due to traffic? Could your school flunk you for missing class to attend a funeral?....what would happen to an employer
who was not patriotic enough to let his or her employees attend funerals of fallen soldiers? Who could accuse you of not
supporting the troops, or not being patriotic....come ...wave a flag if you wish.....could your senator or representative afford to be less patriotic
than a few lefties?.....could anyone fault you for wanting to honor those who died in your name?..could others be shamed into taking care
of the injured....if we lined up at the hospitals to watch the ambulances roll in?

We could, of course, all put a dollar in an offering basked for the family of the deceased. We could volunteer at the hospitals until they could not
help to change something do deal with the lines of volunteers that snaked for blocks around rehab hospitals. There are many more things we could
do...but we could start here....just go to a funereal.....one.........

So now ...do not tell me you are helpless..do not tell me you have no idea what you can do. Now that the idea has been shared........the rest is up to you.

I am a child of the 60s and 70s...I remember when a rag tag small group of students demonstrated on my campus...the ruckus in the press was weeks in the debate.......
what more effect could mothers and grandmothers, vets and bank tellers, grandfathers and fathers have?......what issue can all of us come together on if it is not that those who have died or
sacrificed loved ones or body parts in our name deserve our respect?

Be Well

Fudo

on western Zen, and Buddhism as a whole

2007-02-11T10:58:00.000-06:00

One of the difficulties of transmitting a way across cultures, is that there are things that do not transfer. We westerners are terribly myopic...what happens here and what we think about it is all that is important....we wandered into a recent war because we could not see beyond our own borders to what would happen if we set off alone to persue something most of the rest of the world found abhorent.

There are Buddhists in the world today who do still think the medical professions are indeed not right livelihood. There are more Buddhists in the world who feel the highest ranking woman should bow to the lowest ranking man than there are who think there should be equality between the sexes...My fellow monks in Japan could not comprehend the fact that there were women in the west who wanted to be nuns....Japanese nuns tend to be orphans who are raised by a temple...few women in Japan would seek to be a priest or a monk...and they certainly would not be encouraged by the Zen community to seek such an ill fitting path...In Japan the group is more important than an individual to this day..the group just looks funny if female forms are underneath the robes...there is a small minority that feels differently ..but this is still the prevailing attitude..... There are probably as many Buddhists in the world today who still think it is impossible to be enlightened while in a female body as there are who think the sex of one's body does not matter......these are the facts........pretending they are not true because we do not see them does not make them go away...

This being said, not every so called "good" solution we in the west have attempted is in fact an improvement. Some of the quaint things we have discarded have in fact been part of the baby that has been discarded with the bathwater.

Saying the sex of the body does not matter does nothing about adapting methods and teachings that have primarily been for one sex to the new way.......there is not a lot about how to handle sexuality in the sangha (an issue the Buddha tried hard to avoid)in what has been brought to this shore.... and not addressing this in the new way will lead to a whole new set problems as we move forward.......witness all the problems of a sexual nature that have occured here in the west...that just do not seem to be that much of an issue in Japan........should men and women practice together an how is not a question that can really be anwered by "of course" without developing some kind of definintions of what is appropriate and how to actually bring this "of course" into a real functioning sangha.

One of the teachings I was exposed to in Japan was about begging and offerings......there is a basic teaching in Buddhism from the first about begging....which was dismissed as "difficult" in America for example.....since the practice is fairly unpleasant for the monk...no one really tries to hard to find a way to incorporate this practice in the west.....and many excuses as to why it cannot be done are offered.....there are things you learn while begging..especially if you are taught to beg in the traditional Buddist way...that you stop at every house..not just the rich or likely to respond ones...that you accept every offering.....nothing is spurned....if you are given a shot of saki..you knock it back...sometimes this is a source of entertainment for some less than respectful people in Japan..to force the monk to compromise the vow not to drink intoxicants and to throw them into conflict with the precepts and the practice about drink....but when the shot is just swallowed a lesson is presented to all who are there. It also breeds a less....well rigid and less easy to understand and interpret view of the precepts...In begging we are taught to sacrifice our honor, our face, our pride, our expectations and our beliefs for what is considered a greater good...there is no such training in most of the Sanghas I have visited in the west. No one wants to go begging....it is intersting to me that when I found a way to actually go begging in America...my experience of begging was virtually the same...about as many of the people gave..about the same average amount..about as many drove me away, about as many taunted me...about as many appreciated what I was doing ...and about as many were led to approach me and ask about what was going on....in spite of all the logic offered as to why we could not do this practice in America....I found it not all that hard to accomplish...when I wanted to.

In the west we practice according to our preference...and style triumphs over substance. I do not know how you become egoless doing exactly as your ego wishes you to do......in Japan we did things we did not want to do at all....all the time....and it was good for us...and we learned we did not need to indulge our egos in every moment....I am waiting to see this idea transfer to the west...so far the effort seems feeble, and the way more about feeding our ego rather than slowly starving it.

It seems to me this is the very baby of Zen.....and it has been tossed with the bathwater. Perhaps it is time to look again beyond the front door of our countries borders, and see if the baby on the ground there is still alive enough to bring back into our lives.

Maybe it would be better to examine some of the conflicts and resolve them to pretend they do not exist. One of the practical problems presented in the modern world presents itself in choices I am offered right now...I have two teachers who have offered to transmit teacher's robes to me...One is respected in Japan, but has problems with many here in America. One is a man and one is a woman. One is fairly well respected in a tiny community in the West, but will never be respected by the establishment in Japan. One is condsidered a respectible member of a long and well established lineage....one is considered a less than desireable member of an old lineage. One would be an international bridge to help bring the old ways to the west..and in the short term an advantage to the idea of planting the dharma in a wide way in the west...one I think really has it...and is going to plant deep the roots...that will take generations to earn respect, and likely be leader of a very small group for a very long time...and if they ever gain notice..it will be long after they are dead..

Interestingly ...both have begged with a bowl....for hours in hot robes and straw sandals...in the hot sun....in tropical humidity.

I have recieved the precepts in two lineages....now I can choose which shade my teacher's robes will be......"once basic approaches are determined...then there are guiding rules"....I am a metaphor for Zen in the west....we too have yet to determine our basic approach....I am grieved that many seem to be choosing an approach that indulges ego in order to raise the funds necessary to earn a living in the west. An approach that feeds the ego, rather than working to bring it under our control, one where style triumphs over substance, and one where only offerings of sufficent quality and quantity are acceptible.

Be Well

Fudo

keeping promises and the precepts

2007-02-09T09:56:00.000-06:00

Recently I was exposed to someone preparing to take the precepts for the first time....in their excitement
and enthusiasm of the impending event...and after a long preparation the person in an excess of
that enthusiasm chose to share their insight into the majesty of the precepts.

Now I do not know how it works in other places with other people, but when I say I have transmitted
the precepts to another person......I do not mean that I have given them a list of several instructions on
how to live their life.....I mean that the person in question has at least demonstrated a basic understanding
of the nature of the vows that they are taking.

I can understand the precepts being offered in the hope that the person in question will come to some sort of
understanding at some possible future date.......but I feel that is like asking a person in the court of law to swear
they will tell the truth and nothing but the truth someday.

In case you have not figured it out...the precepts are a koan. They are impossible to keep. Much effort is
spent in trying to rationalize all this out...but like all koans.....the effort is futile....by the time you pull the first precept
out of memory and dust it off...the moment to act according to its guidelines is already passed. "do not kill"...you have to
kill....if you do not kill something else...you will kill yourself.

Chase your tail on that one for as long as you wish.....but it ends up throwing you back into life as it is...completely.
In order to keep this simple precept, you have to leap beyond it ....and just kill killing. Before I can transmit the precepts
to you, you have to kill the precepts. This has been said many ways one famous one....."if you see the Buddha walking down the
road, kill him"....how can you reconcile that one with do not kill?

I do not know about other teachers, but I will not transmit the precepts to anyone who thinks ....that eating vegetables is living according to
the precepts. Or that not going to war is living according to the precepts...or that it is impossible to be a butcher, or a farmer , or even a gardener
while still being living according to the precepts....or that kind speech has to be quiet or pleasing to the ears.

Every time someone tries to pull the precepts on me....I wonder who transmitted the precepts to them..........as for me?....Shoken Winecoff Roshi...and Narasaki
Tsugen Roshi. Someday I would like to find someone to transmit what I was offered to...it is sort of an obligation.......so I poke about ....waving a stick....
looking for someone whom I can seal as having glimpsed the koan....or at the very least...understands that the vows are impossible to keep, and that they have just been handed
a koan that will never be completely solved.

Be Well

Fudo

on the practice of building temples

2007-02-04T10:15:00.000-06:00

Perhaps I have a different perspective on the practice of Zen because I came to it differently
than many modern western practitioners. I was following a tradition that was exotic and different
so had already worked out my need for something "special" that made me stand out from the crowd....
my teacher died and the ways to connect with that tradition died with him.

So I was casting about for a new way....during the turbulence surrounding my leaving of my old way....I
sat down to figure out how to go forward..it took a while...so I sat for quite a while...then eventually
wandered off to a nearby Zen temple to see if what there was to this "just sitting".....what I saw there was
a fairly off putting funereal atmosphere with a bunch of apparently really self righteous explorers off on
some exotic trip that just did not seem to be very ....well........appealing to me. I felt like there was something
to the teachings of the Buddha, but had a real hard time connecting the uptight even anal atmosphere where you
had to practice for a year before they let you light a candle to what I had been reading.

Then I met this guy who was building a temple. I asked If I could go help him........he said sure...one of the first
projects we worked on was a set of stone steps at retreat center. We went and hauled the stone from the quarry, pulled
the huge slabs into place and fit them together...then we refit them...and refit them again..and again...and a project I thought
would take an afternoon took a week....all the while me complaining to my wife (who labored on the steps with me along with
me) that this crazy old bald guy never seemed to be satisfied until everything was perfect. I even wrote my first Zen poem about
the project....

At Hokyoji
the stone steps
are never finished.

I took a while to understand ...I did not understand at the time....or even for a few years later.....we worked on projects together because I thought
there was something important happening, and I wanted to be part of it...here was something that I could relate to that in my innocence I thought was
wholly good. I could sense there was something big and good here...I just wanted to be a part of it.

Eventually like all innocents, I became a bit disillusioned about some of the things I had worked on...politics and egos seemed ever present..and what to an innocent
seemed wholly good, was in fact just as riddled with corruption and greed as any other human institution.

I kept showing up...so it seemed eventually that I should join up..so I asked my teacher to ordain me.. He refused. I asked again.....he refused again....we did lay ordination ...then he
made some vague remarks about maybe someday...we continued to work together on another temple....He said he wanted me to go to Japan....I did not really want to go......but
I made a deal with the devil...I would go...but only as an ordained monk. I could not afford to pay the fees for lay practice, and did not want to be on the outside looking in...If I went ..It
was going to be all or nothing. He agreed. ...and paid for the trip because I worked for three months full time with him to finish his new Zen Center.

One of the most memorable experiences I had while practicing in the 750 year old temple was raking leaves off of the graves of some of the first monks at the temple. ...they were probably the ones who built it. There was a shift in perspective...and I realized that as a part of this tradition, some new monk might be raking leaves off of my grave 750 years from now. As I walked up the stone path to the temple gate ...I realized that even though no one remembered their name, nor what they thought about...nor what ever we think is important about us today, we still walked on the paths they built...we sheltered under the roof they built.....we sat on the floor they assembled...our practice stood on their bones.

I remember my teacher's smile when I put it together for him some years later when we were in a group debating about where to build the Buddha hall on our newly donated monastery land.
All the builders, the donors, the business men said to build on the hill above the old farm house...because the well was nearby and it would be cheaper and more practical. My teacher wanted to build it upon another hill ...a way across the lane on a beautiful site where the view would be timeless, but the cost more expensive and the logistics a bunch more difficult. Thinking back to the stone steps, and the beautiful temples on the Japanese hills, when he asked for my opinion....I said,"Well if we were building for the next 20 years...I would build it above the farmhouse...but if we are building it for the next 300 years ...I would put it on the hill across the lane." The beautiful Buddha Hall (and the shell of the kitchen and residence building) now stand on the hill across the lane....because I understood that we were not building the stone steps for the next 20 years.....we were building the stone steps to last forever.

Often in these days where everything we think is important...and the next fad is more important than the last....where short term profit is all there is and we all want enlightenment now...or better yet yesterday, and we all want everyone else to be enlightened right now as well...it is easy to lose some perspective. All I have to do when I get to caught up in the right now, and the desire to get the damn job finished so I can get on with the next...is to look at the temple on the hill.........where the new steps were just as carefully placed as the first set I worked on. .....and think about who might be walking on them 750 years from now.....and what I think loses its importance. No one will remember my name (even though it is inscribed on the temple rolls) no one will care what I thought. No one will have any idea why I took the time to build the steps........but maybe someday...some monk will be sweeping my grave.....and wake up just a little bit.

So now......when the tempest of the moment upsets others, It does not seem to bother me so much. What I think dims in proportion. What others (and even me) think or feel is only a flash of lightening. Which will followed by a peal of thunder, which will drop a little rain that will flow off the solid roof I helped build that shelters generations of monks striving for perfection I will probably never reach, and flows through the gardens I helped plant to lift the spirits of the troubled, and nourishes the trees that shelter the bell tower that we built that will call the devout to practice for centuries to come, then down the well built stone steps, and into the graveyard to soak my dry bones.

I am an American, I felt I did not need to go to Japan and go through all that militant training. I did not want to go...I pretty much hated most of what went on there...I am not fond of getting up early ..or even sitting for hours on end. I hate formality in all its forms. What most people love about Zen, I do not much care for. Fortunately we do not all have to be alike. The tradition of Zen has so much more than sitting meditation involved in it...and there are many ways to practice. I did not need to go to Japan, I pretty much did not like being there........but I am ever so glad I went.

People often say I am a poor excuse for a monk. I do not really understand the teachings of the Buddha......and certainly I am not the least bit enlightened. I would have to agree... I am not neat and tidy, I do not always pick up after myself or sit longer and straighter than anyone else. I avoid much more than a period or so of Zazen a day with an effort that would put an Olympic athlete to shame. I sneak satisfying food at every opportunity because rice and veggies just do not float my boat. I laugh when I should be serious, and am serious when I should laugh...all in all...a pretty much disreputable monk. There is no hope here for the enlightenment so many striving on the hill might someday have. I spent some time in Samadhi...I find it boring....... a couple of months and even a mental orgasm fades in its attraction. I have nothing against those who strive for Nirvana...it is a noble chase. It is just not for me.....and since I can no longer tolerate the diet nor the endless sitting physically....I will never really practice in the temple on the hill.

I am not really all that concerned. I just look at those stone steps.......and figure it is enough.

Be Well

Fudo

He lied to me (on the nature of the precepts)

2007-01-04T10:55:00.000-06:00

Dear J and I,

I think that sometimes our puritan roots come peeking out from under our robes.

The precepts are not laws that someone must follow...the precepts are guidelines to navigate our own lives by...but just as a map of the sea will show a "ideal" route...one must take into consideration wind, wave, and light conditions as well as the size of the ship, and the power and turning radius of this particular boat, when one decides how close to navigate through the shoals..the map shows the shoals..but it does not show the safe route through for us under all conditions...just because from our place (hindsight is 20/20) we can point out how a navigator has deviated from the "ideal" route, does not mean that the route the navigator chose was not a safe route for the conditions, nor does it mean the general "ideal" route was the "best" in those particular conditions.

Shohaku Okumura Sensei put it this way "one does not have to go to the north star to steer by it."

Even the Buddha said that telling a lie was proper if it moved someone out of a burning building. This was an example of skillful means.

Since none of us is actually in the conditions of another of us...we have no real idea as to the proper or safe course another individual must navigate through their life to reach the other shore safely...we are specifically charged with not becoming "precept police" for others so as to gather examples of others failings to "properly follow" our interpretations of the precepts that we can wave like bloody flags pointing to others failures. (there is also a precept that says one should not put others down in order to raise themselves up)...we should not even use others actions that have harmed us as justification for our present state of emotion. We are always responsible for our own navigation of the precepts. Using others failures to prop up our own ideas and emotions is also in "technical violation" of the precepts. I am not angry because he hit me, or lied to me...I am angry because I am afraid. ....perhaps afraid he will hurt me or betray me again....but in at least acknowledging the true cause of my anger...I can then take steps not to let the fear run my responses....and thus steps to assure that my behavior better matches the ideal course set out in the precepts.

I am the child of a man too fond of the bottle for his whole life (a sensitive man who could not handle the things the world threw at him without self-medicating). My father beat my Mother (when he was drinking which was whenever he had the money for a drink), and my Mother stayed with him for her own reasons. I grew up in a household where not one day went by without a screaming contest between my parents, I grew up thinking this was the way people lived. For the early part of my adulthood I blamed my parents for my fighting with my spouse, and proudly held that I was better than my parents because I never hit anyone who did not hit me first......then I grew up and realized that at 27 perhaps I could not longer blame my parents for the state of my life, and now that I had been an adult for a while, perhaps I was where I was because I was choosing to do the things that led me to where I was, and since I did not like the place I was , perhaps if I was going to change that place, I was going have to change what I did that led me to that place.

This idea has led me to the place I am today, which is by my own acknowledgment, a less than perfect place according to the precepts. but it is one hell of a lot better a place than I would be in if I kept blaming my parents, and acting exactly like them through my own fear.

I can give you a long list of the names I have been called along the journey...some by well meaning and compassionate people. I laugh at the list...because the names are all accurate...I am not separate from one of the least of my fellow beings. While the list is all true, and I am far from perfect, this place is still a whole lot better than some of the places I have been, I know that through my personal experience. As well meaning as the advice I change my course is, I am quite satisfied with the journey I am navigating right now.

The precepts need to be taken as a whole..but not for the purpose of us judging other's adherence to them...the precepts along with all the teachings..including skillful means are taken as a whole as guidelines for our own choices...not as rules we or any one else need to stick to without fail.

In Zen our light is directed inward ...towards our own behavior, our own conditions. We are charged with being compassionate toward those who share our own conditions to one degree or another. Sometimes in that compassion we want to see that others do not make the same mistakes that we did, but each person must learn in their own way and in their own time..there is no making them get it before they screw up like we did....we needed the conditions to be right before we learned what we know now...so do our children, spouses, and friends. Even though we would like to share our hard won wisdom with others, the truth as old Homeless Kodo put it is "We cannot share so much as a fart together."...your experience of my fart is completely different than my experience of my fart...even though we are in the same time and place....and of course there is no you and no me.......lol.....well there is ...sort of ....you are not relieved by my expelling of gas.You will not learn by my experience. There are separate beings, just not separate from conditions we share...both of us must wait till the bell rings before we flee the smell.

Be Well

Fudo

What is this transmission?

2006-05-16T07:25:00.000-05:00

donald wrote:
>
> In the transmission, other than the ceremonial, certification, sealing
> and robing, is there anything spiritual? What I am asking is that
> your description belongs to the "realm of visible forms". Is there
> anything "unvisible, real and true" being transmitted?

Dear Donald,

In Soto what is being transmitted is a way of being. Dogen constantly
refers to "negotiating the way". As far as I know the Soto sect does not
postulate on the unknowable.....the invisible....and as for truth...well
that seems to be in the eye of the beholder.

One of course, has to be able to see the way in order to negotiate it.
What is being stamped and approved is your "way of being" in the
world...now one can postulate whether there is something invisible or
some understanding that is being demonstrated here...but Soto pretty
much sticks to what you can see, hear,touch, taste, and smell. So we
watch...we see how you raise the curtain...there is a famous story where
one master turns to a senior monk and says about two monks raising the
Zendo curtain..."the one on the right has it." We put emphasis on acting
like a Buddha in the world, not about what you think about, or how
clearly you see.......what is important in Soto is whether or not you
act like a Buddha or Bodhisattva....not whether or not you know how one
should act. What we desire is to see the manifestation of the
Bodhisattva here and now, in each and everything you do.....so what is
certified is this demonstration.

Often in Soto circles you see reading, thinking, discussion in order to
understand spoken of as a waste of time.....if you take time to
understand, you have missed the moment..one cannot understand this
moment, one can only understand the last moment......so you are always a
step behind, a bit off if you wait for understanding. What matters is
not if you understand the story about Buddha holding up the flower and
Mahakashapa smiling...... Ananda understood the story ...it was not
enough....what is required is that in the instant the flower is held up
there is a smile.....this is why Mahakashapa got the robe and Ananda did
not. Ananda had memorized every word, understood every teaching, but was
still too late with the smile.

*grin*

Be Well

Fudo

Questions

2006-05-15T09:20:00.000-05:00

S wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm new to the group and I'd like to jump right in and
> ask some questions to the Scurrilous Monk, but also to
> the group in general.
>
> What are your views on practicing alone? Practicing
> without personal access to a teacher, for
> transmission? Practicing without a zendo to attend and
> a community to practice zazen with?
>

Practicing alone is not having a Zen practice.

Practicing without a teacher is not having a Zen practice.

Practicing without a community to practice with is not having a Zen
practice.

I take refuge in the Buddha (the teacher)
I take refuge in the Dharma (the teachings)
I take refuge in the Sangha ( community of believers)

These are basic precepts of Zen Buddhism. If you do not have all
three...you do not have a Zen practice.

A Zen practice is a specific thing (or things as there are both Rinzai
and Soto zen practices).

Zen is a transmission outside words and letters....how are you going to
get the transmission without a teacher?.....how are you going to get
something outside words and letters by reading words and letters. Now it
is possible to download something from the ethers by yourself......you
could call it a transmission in the same way that tv is
transmitted....but it is not a Zen transmission...it is not even a
standard it is not an automatic transmission....it might not even been a
sane transmission.(I have seen some pretty out there claims in my time).
The transmission of the authentic Buddha seal is and can only be
accomplished by someone who has it authenticated.

There is no tradition that says "do whatever you like". ....period.....
There is no anarchy tradition.....what an oxymoron. ....there are even
standards for what Unitarianism is....and there are standards for
Ordination and membership. You are welcome to stop by a Unitarian Church
for a Service.......but It is not proper to call yourself a Unitarian
unless you subscribe to the standard they set....it is also not proper
to call your self a "Zen" person unless you subscribe to the standards
the Zen traditions set as standard.

Metaphysically speaking, is it better to do something rather than
nothing?.....yes, but it is better to do any one thing the correct way
then to do everything incorrectly.

It is better to have a real practice in your real life then it is to
have hours and hours of pretending you have a relationship with some one
on line. Sex with a real partner is different than cyber sex no matter
how good an imagination you have. (how many ways can you type Oooh ooooh
oooh?)

No Zen teachers in your community?....you are not able to travel to
visit one even for a day or a few hours?......then perhaps Zen is not
for you. Rather than having a fantasy relationship with Christy
Brinkley...you might be more rewarded by asking out a local
girl....rather then practicing your fantasy of Zen, you would be better
off connecting with whatever real tradition is available to you in your
local community.

Sitting around having cyber sex or imagining you are in love with
Christy Brinkley can indeed be life changing experiences. It is my
contention that mowing your lawn or breathing each breath are also life
changing experiences....what makes breathing and mowing lawns Zen
experiences is if they are done in the context of having a Zen teacher
and practicing with a Zen community. They are community Service if they
are assigned to you by a judge, or Christian activities if you are
baptized. They are a form of spiritual masturbation if you do it all for
and by yourself as you yourself envision good things to be.

Ok then, what if what is locally available is not your cup of
tea?....maybe it is not exotic enough for you?....maybe it is too
common?...maybe the people are a bunch of hypocrites?.....or you were
personally hurt by someone associated with them?...or they are too
authoritarian for you?.....hmm....maybe there is something wrong with
you? None of the girls or guys about town "good" enough for you?.....

I am sure Christy is just waiting to go out with someone who can't get
a date at home. I am sure Zen teachers , like Christy Brinkley, are
sitting around looking for yet another know-it- all with a cup already
full to show up at their door too. Might I be so bold as to suggest you
fix your problems before you get into a relationship?....maybe if you
had something to offer the local girls, you would not have to head off
to New York in search of the next available super model. It is possible
that the girl you are cybering with looks like Christy Brinkley...it is
not too likely though...girls who look like Christy have better things
to do with their time. It just might be a better use of your time to go
out and be nice to the local girls, be polite, make a little nice
conversation, listen to them, make them smile. Zen might look better to
you then whatever is around the corner......but if the Zen teacher on
line were indeed a super-model....he or she would not be sitting around
cybering with you either.

Ahh ha! ...now you have me!!! How come I am sitting around offering
advice on the internet?...(why do I say I am not teaching Zen
here?).....because I am a crappy monk (see the title of the blog). I am
a bad example....no one bothers to come to me for teaching because I do
not really sound like a monk (I don't really look like the stereotype
either)...I am not exotic...not even cool......I am certainly not a
Christy Brinkley like monk. (no matter what others might imagine me to
be). I am not worth much...but perhaps by sitting around this imaginary
sangha I can point someone to what is real....after all...I have nothing
better to do with my time.

There are no shortage of folks who will tell you how great they are as
they sell you something over the internet...(their latest book for
example)....or who will be your guru over the net.......but believe me
...they are not Christy Brinkley.....girls like Christy do not spend
their time cybering with guys like you....neither does any Zen teacher
worth their salt. It is possible to imagine a Christy Brinkley look a
like who waits for guys like us to type ooh ooh with her.....but it just
does not happen in real life. Guys like Narasaki Tsugen Roshi or Akiba
Roshi...or even plain old Shoken Winekoff Roshi.....just are not
available to any old Joe or Jane on the internet...sorry.....it does not
happen.

Please, what ever your practice, make it a real practice in your real life.

Be Well,

Fudo

Fear?

2006-04-13T10:57:00.000-05:00

Dear J,

I suppose one could approach learning to dance by attempting never to make a misstep. I find this approach usually leaves me standing on the edge of the dance floor watching the wall flowers on the other side of the floor.

I find that when I step out and try to put my feet in the correct place, dancing becomes a lot more fun...and when the first part of the dancing (asking a partner to dance) is performed correctly (or even sometimes rather poorly) it has a much greater chance of success then never stepping out to dance at all...so I just throw caution and my ego into the wind...and step out and do the best I can...sometimes it is enough, but it is always more then never stepping out at all. I have even been known to transform a wallflower into a dancer with a poorly mumbled cliche, or the oldest line the the book. I am always surprised at how well a wallflower can catch even a poorly tossed line.

It has been my experience that even a poorly tossed line, mumbled in an unclear voice, can turn a sick person into a poet, or a dying man into a philosopher. It can make a sick room into a ball room, and a hospice into a party for two.

The dance is always performed by dancers, those standing about with their hands in their pockets never get to dance..........there is a reason to be sad, and a reason to get out there and dance with the first person you see standing about with their hands in their pockets. What could be a more joyous thing than making dancers out of a couple of wallflowers?

I encourage to you to dance. ....thats it......... tap your feet...come on now......move your knees....hands up......there you go!!!.....you can't look any sillier then I do....now dance.

Be Well

Fudo

On Thumpers

2006-01-13T10:11:00.000-06:00

It matters not to me what holy writing a thumper thumps.

The problem with cutting a pasting little snippets of holy writings (the Koran, the Bible, the Sutras or the Torah) is that they can and have been used to justify any action the person chooses to be doing. They make every action righteous. Thumping clippings from the Bible made Apartheid and the Holocaust righteous, Thumping the Koran made flying airplanes into buildings righteous, Thumping the Sutras made the rape of China and the Aum terrorisms righteous.

Apartheid arose in the mind before the structures were built in society to reinforce it, just like a temple is built when it arises in the mind. Apartheid arose from the thought that others are beneath you and the Bible was used to justify it.......obviously such an idea can be ennobled from the Sutra's as well.

The problem with lifting little sections of the holy writings to justify your position is that pretty much anything can be justified in such a manner. If you read the whole Bible, you get a different idea than from "an eye for an eye"....or if you read the whole section that describes homosexuality as a sin...you would also not eat pork, or shrimp or lobster, your wife would be your property, and jerking off as much of a sin as ......well never mind..... and almost any male (and most females) are right there in sin with every gay or lesbian. The point being that the thumper is using the writings to justify their position. They do not care if that position is consistent with the rest of the writings, They are not looking for the way , they are only looking to justify their way. Thumpers are are dangerous. When they are alone they are even more scary, because there is no check at all on how crazy they can become...there is nowhere for them to get a sanity check....but then again..a thumper does not thump to have their ideas tested in crucible of a discussion, they thump to justify their position, their reality, created by their ideas. When challenged a thumper has nothing to say....all they can do it thump some more, and use some stolen wisdom to try and justify their own position, because by nature, a thumper has no wisdom of their own.

Before we get all holier then thou and pat ourselves on the back, we are all thumpers at times too, just like we all are pretentious sometimes too. A wise person recognizes this tendency in themselves, and works to minimize it in themselves rather then maximize the danger to themselves and others. A wise person gets a sanity check from those around them from time to time, just to make sure they have not wandered too far afield.

Before we get too down on ourselves for our tendency to wander off the path all too easily, let us remember that all do this sometimes as well. We also are sometimes wise, and sometimes noble as well. There is nothing that arises in any person, be that nobility or ignorance, that does not arise in us as well. To pretend otherwise is just lying to ourselves. Every decent Zen teacher I have ever met has someone they respect to check themselves with so they do not wander off too far afield in their life. Power corrupts, a wise man or woman gets a check on this corruption from time to time.

Wisdom is not ignoring anything...ignoring anything is ignorance. Ignoring it in others is not kind, ignoring it in ourselves is dangerous.

English is a tough language...there is no pronoun for the you that is me, and the me that is you, because it is really different then "us". Us is more our separate beings gathered together. The big "I" includes you and the big "you" includes me. When anyone calls anyone on anything, they are indeed calling themselves on it at the same time...there is nothing we dislike more in others, then what we dislike in ourselves. Ask anyone who has lived with a former smoker, a former drinker, a former addict, a former intellectual, a former anything.

The point here is ..no one is beneath us...they are exactly us. No matter how much we huff or stomp away, or use the sutras to justify our position, the basic point of the whole thing (any holy writing) has been missed the moment we think we can leave. The moment the thought arises that there is indeed a they that is not us, that can be left, we are lost. One of the basic points of Jesus' teaching was that he was exactly the beggar you treated poorly, he is exactly the "homo" or the "terrorist" you deny basic human rights to. (oh wait..we already did that to him didn't we??? wow...Deja Vu all over again.....) He is exactly the "least of my brothers "(what ever you do to the least.... you do him...exactly).....hmmm a most Buddhist of teachings........None of us is alone in missing these teachings, most of us miss them most of the time. Whatever we do to anyone, we do at the same time to Buddha, Jesus, Mohamed, Bahula, Moses, Shiva, Zeus, The goddess, the green man, to Hitler, Pol Pot, the republicans and the democrats.

Be Well

Fudo

Dogen Zen and the time Zen was pure

2006-01-09T09:03:00.000-06:00

I appreciate the motives that make people strive to recreate a Zen that is pure like it was in Dogen's time. I think it is a little naive to think that only now, only here has a similar effort been made. I know that in Japan I heard the same sort of talk from "noble" efforts being made to return the practice to what is was before it got polluted.....by having to pay for temples, and having been "institutionalized". I am sure one find the same movements in Tibetan Buddhism, even in the Catholic church......there is nothing new or unique about such efforts....it is only our ego that thinks that this time..when we do it ...will it be successful. Dogen was a revolutionary as well.....history shows us the problem with revolutions is that they inevitably become what they revolted against, or they die before they have the opportunity to. The structures exist for a reason...the Modern Soto Shu is there for a reason, it did not become what it is because everyone in it it is corrupt, it became what is because there was a Soto-shu shaped hole in the universes that needed filling. There are more reformers in Japan than there are in New Mexico, or Texas, or Minnesota.....all wanting to go back to the time when things were pure....the problem is ....there never was a time when things were pure.

The Zen we think of as "Dogen Zen" never existed...even in Dogen's time. There was no group of more noble than other monks huddled in a small group by a fire somewhere..or in a shack...aspiring to a "true" practice...well there was...but they had the same problems that we have today..and only stayed by the fire long enough to find a noble sponser....problems like who is going to pay for the shack?...and where are we going to get food?..How are we going to exist in this time and place? Who is going to cook lunch so we can eat? The lotus only bloomed in muddy water. If one stops by to visit Eihieji today one can still see the monuments to the ones who paid for the building of the temple. Those rich guys ...or rich family......in Old Japan..you know..the nobles?...the ones who paid for everything?...the ones you had to sell on the idea that building a temple was a good place to spend their money?...the ones who in their grief tried to assure a place in nirvana for themselves and their children, while they were busy lopping of the heads of peasants, and killing themselves with swords? No smart temple priest these days caters to a single donor....because that means the donor wants to be in charge...I am sure things were different in Dogen's day when single donors were all that was available. Not to mention, picking the right donor....because If your donor got his head lopped off.....well unless you were politic enough you were out of the temple when the new noble moved in, replaced by the priest who played the game better than you did, or at least was luckier than you at the track where priests picked out which horse to bet their life and practice on. If you were out...so was all that you carefully tended, and your noble flock of underlings either went with you into obscurity , found a new rich person who wanted to be assured of nirvana, or bowed to the new order.

Well what about Ancient China during the flowering of Buddhism in China?.....as bad or worse.

Well then let us go back to when it all was new.....the time of the living Buddha were a perfect group of Arhats with shining halos about their heads sat in gardens and ate rice begged from the people on the street......No muddy water there...not if we ignore the fact that even if Buddha was liberal enough to let low caste males into his sangha...even he could not bend enough to let women in....until and unless it was understood that the highest ranked woman must bow to the lowest rank man (as the lowest ranked man I can tell you that this idea is not dead in some parts of the world.) The we have the rules about not having sex with trees. Buddha only made the rules as they were needed....so we must have had a least one tree fucker mucking up the picture. Then of course, there was Ananda. He had memorized every word of the Buddha, before he played his robes and position into the bed of every woman he could....maybe all those women who were bowing at his feet in the morning, had a little trouble not bowing at night. I am sure there were volunteers(this too is as old as time), some more voluntary then others. Yet none of this was cause for Ananda to be removed from the sangha....that was reserved for those who planned the coup. Ooops....politics in the original Sangha? You are kidding right?

So where is this perfection that we are going to go back to?.where is the mud that is purer than this mud?....The Lotus has always bloomed in muddy water. Perhaps our efforts would be better spent blooming where we are planted, rather than chasing after the myth of a more noble time.

How do we get rid of our anger?

2006-01-07T12:58:00.000-06:00

Many people come to the practice of Zen or to any religion for that matter because of a profound feeling that something is wrong. There is something wrong with "them"....the is something wrong with "us"...therefore what "is" needs to be fixed.....more so for what is "wrong" with others over what is "misunderstood" about ourselves.
But the essential feeling of "wrongness" in ourselves is what motivates most practice...we practice to fix what is "wrong" with us so we can fix what is "wrong" with the world and everyone else. There is something wrong with us because we feel anger....there is something wrong with him because he is angry......anger, sadness and suffering are essential to our being, someone once said that "all life is suffering". This sense of wrongness is not "wrong" because it drives us to seek something better, or at least it can....it drives us to seek a solution, it forces us to begin to heal...like the swelling of a bruised ankle and the pain that keeps us off our feet for a while or lets us know when we are hurting ourselves more. Pain is not "bad"in its essential nature, anger is not "bad" by its nature. Anger is natural, it is neither good nor bad by its nature. So getting rid of anger is not the goal, anger has a purpose and a function.

I remember a developmentally disabled kid who was not under my direct care, but in the area where I worked. He used to pull down his pants all the time. His well meaning care takers decided to put a lock on his belt so he could not remove his pants. It kept him from removing his pants, even in the bathroom, which lead to some unfortunate problems that had not existed before......the problem was not that taking off your pants is bad, it is that there are appropriate places to do so and to not do so.....it was a matter of discrimination...rather than teaching the kid discrimination, they made the problem worse.

As the writer of "The Merging of Difference and Unity" tells us "all things have their function, it is a matter of use in the appropriate situation". Well what can be the purpose of anger?......as you have noted anger usually results from hurt or fear. Fear most often results from an experience of hurt...as all have noted, an animal with no experience with humans does not fear them. Hurt gives rise to fear which gives rise to anger. Anger functions properly to protect us (and those we care about) from hurt.

What then does anger tell us if we listen?...it tells us there is an unhealed hurt existing somewhere...there is a fear there that needs to be addressed. Now should we fear crossing a busy street?.....yes a certain amount of fear is healthy, and anger is a natural response to a driver speeding down the street where your children are playing. One should not try and eliminate anger, or leave anger somewhere.

Just dropping anger like a rock is no more of an answer than taking drugs so you can continue to walk on an injured ankle. What ever triggered your anger will continue to trigger your anger whenever it arises. One could address the anger by many dysfunctional methods ..the ones we often choose..we can suppress it, we can kill our children so we no longer fear so tremendously for them in an increasingly hostile world, we can shoot the driver and stop the car. Shooting the driver or the kids does not work either..there are always more children and more drivers, and no end here to our anger.

Or we can sit down with our anger, and use it as a tool to probe where we are hurt....I fear for my children, that is where this anger arises, what then can I do that is best for myself and all beings to protect my children?....well what about forbidding them to cross the street or go anywhere near the street? nah that will not work in the real world...What about sitting around working on my anger? darn that does not work either..it just keeps popping up........what about knowing they are not "my" children and when I think about them I get angry, so I should just forget about them? nah that really does not work either..........what about lowering the speed limit, having the city put up warning signs,increase enforcement, or put in speed bumps?...well one or all of these might be effective... maybe I should work towards a truly effective method to reduce my fear, and in doing so I will reduce my anger..and by the way my neighbor is angry about that too, and of course I might save a child in the process, not to mention the life of a driver which would be ruined by his carelessness should he ever hit a kid. Now I have used my anger to reduce anger in myself and my neighbor, protected both the driver and the children....who could possibly say the anger that motivated this action was bad?

Sometimes the fear that makes us angry is not even rational...my elder daughter is afraid of worms.....wave a worm at her and she becomes angry. Forbidding worms in her presence is not a practical solution...as long as she fears worms ...worms will make her angry. What needs to be healed here is not her anger, but the fear of worms...she is not willing to work on this right now.....but should her anger ever become her concern, the way to fix it is to fix the irrational fear of worms. If we fear men for example for some happening in our past, or fear intimacy, or fear anything, we have a hurt that needs healing. Our anger points to these injuries. Some fear is rational...if it is rational, then find realistic ways to protect yourself (or others) and reduce the fear when it results in anger, if the fear arises from a real hurt that needs healing, get the help we need to heal the hurt, if the fear is irrational there are ways to fix that as well.

Anger is a poison, but like a poison it can be used for both good and evil. Most medicines are poisonous in some dosage. It is a matter of use in the appropriate situation. It is only when we spread it around with no thought, no control, no discrimination that anger poisons everything.

All things have their function, even anger.

Now we shall move from the realm of psychology to Buddhism. Much of our fear comes from incorrect understandings...where Buddhism comes into play is where fear stems from the feeling that "we" are separate from them. We are alone, we are something more than a pile of skandhas..... When anger is directed at "them" then it is not being used appropriately. When Zen directs us to look at what is, then we reduce great amounts of fear, and thus great amounts of anger. When we look at what really is we become not angry at the driver for driving too fast, but ourselves for not calling the street department or whomever is responsible for taking care of speed bumps, perhaps we will even get up off our cushion and make a few calls. (or write a few posts).

When we sit down to let everything go, the last little thing that identifies ourselves to ourselves, the last thing we have to know so we can forget is our own hurts...they are what at the most basic level identify us to ourselves. since the last thing we let go of is "our" pain the last thing we really let go of is "our" anger. Often during the process our practice even makes us more angry, as we bring forth the last of our hurts to be let go, we bring forth more and more essential anger. It is a part of the process, neither to embraced nor shunned, just is....neither good nor bad. (remember the warning that not everything that comes up is pleasant?) Sometimes the fear at this point get so great that one avoids sitting, this is one more place where a teacher who knows what is going on can come and help one through this part of the process. It is also a part of the teacher's role to be the thing there for the student to be angry at, to give the student a place to put the anger, while the surprised student learns to deal with what is happening.

Buddhism offers us the eightfold path, not as a cudgel to beat others who are wrong with, but as a well marked path to end suffering (note: not "our" suffering). Every Buddhist is on the path, some in comfy places, some in not...no one has finished the path while they are alive, nor should anyone be expected to act like they have.

So anger is not something we need to get rid of, it is not wrong to be angry, being angry is just being angry. Now what will you do with your anger? Will you use it or will it use you? It is a matter of use in the appropriate situation.

Be Well
Fudo

What about zen practice and relationships?

2005-12-30T15:15:00.000-06:00

It is much easier to love all mankind then it is to love any particular man or woman.

It is much easier to be in love with our fantasy of what mankind is than to have to love a man or woman as he or she is. .....really loving mankind is in fact loving each man and woman as we love the Buddha (or what we imagine the Buddha to be).

It is possible to abuse a meditation practice to the detriment of relationships. It is possible to leave our significant others behind in our quest for an individual enlightenment. It is one aspect of any Mahayana practice (and Zen is a Mahayana school) to vow not to enter Nirvana until everyone else has entered first. It is my contention that a good place to start is where you are. One should be more concerned with loving care for one's significant other, child or parent then one is with themselves and their individual practice of meditation. One should not sacrifice one moment more to meditation than one needs to get by while failing to attend to our families needs and our responsibilities to those who depend on us, or take care of us.

I have seen many Zen students caught up in the zeal that results from seeing changes in themselves that they forget that it is not really about themselves. It is in fact impossible to forget yourself when all you think about is yourself. There is a big difference between knowing
yourself, and only thinking about yourself. Yes we need to study ourselves to forget ourselves, but only thinking of ourselves will never lead us to forgetting ourselves.

If the changes from your meditation practice do not result in you becoming a better father, mother, son or daughter, partner, employee or boss, or a better Zen teacher if that is your choice of path then your practice is a worthless dead end. It is after all, all about seeing others go ahead in the Zen schools, not about running ahead yourself. It is about where you are right now, not where you should be, or will be if only. It is not about seeing the man who became filled with road rage and wound up causing the death of others as separate from us, as different from us, (thank whoever that we are not in jail with such a bail like that for a reason like that...after all if we had been formed by the forces that shapedthat man We would have done so much better), but rather it is seeing this person as a fellow suffering being, and taking what steps we can right around us to relieve the suffering of those around us who might end up as strung out and frustrated as this man if we do not carefully attend what is going on with them.

Yes we might need to sit down and get calm where we are right now, but we should not spend one minute more in such a practice than we need to be able to stand up and take care of all that is around us, including family, friends, fellow workers, bosses and employees.

Happy New Year,

Fudo

I read Zen is not big on compassionate action..but you seem to be at least somewhat in favor....what is going on?

2005-12-10T08:13:00.000-06:00

Dear K,

Reading again huh? That can be dangerous. It leads to expectations which leads to ........all kinds of distractions.

I guess I can see where one might think that Zen is not much for compassionate action. One might say that there is a koan in there somewhere....because perhaps to some the definition of what sort of action is truly compassionate might differ.

In many religions there are apparent conflicts when people try to act in real life on some vague philosophy or set of moral principles. There are also those who talk the talk but do not walk the walk. We have such people in Zen too. This is why we are less concerned with what kind of talk you can talk....and more concerned by the kind of walk you walk.

If one sees the ultimate goal of life is to become enlightened, the what might be considered compassionate is something that has in the past proved effective as a means to that end.

In Zen this is a set of activities that includes sitting meditation. If death is seen as a part of the process of living, just keeping people alive may not have the same emphasis as say sitting meditation. If keeping your focus on just this moment is effective towards what is seen as the desired end, then telling someone to just be hungry might be sometimes seen as compassionate. Of course some people miss the idea that in order to have a spiritual life you must first have a life..(thank you Thomas Merton). Some in Zen see just sitting your own meditation as the ultimate bodhisatva action. In order to assist others in their enlightenment you must first be enlightened yourself (other wise how do you know what is truly effective?). Sitting down to do zazen (and don't get me started and what zazen is....even Dai Kai and I who are students of the same teacher ..or were...seem to disagree and what zazen is.....) is to some the be all and end all of all that needs to be taught and all that needs to be done by a compassionate person...in fact some say that is all that can really be done.

There are very few people who have had the opportunity to study in Japan. I am one of the fortunate few. Seeing what Zen is there, and what the perceptions of what Zen is here, is most startling. In a temple in Japan all zazen is dropped if something needs to be done for the Sangha. People find much fault with the "funeral" industry that many see as all that Zen is in Japan any longer, but they forget that helping the grieving was something that needed to be done and no one else was doing it. After WW2 there were many widows with children, and an acute shortage of child care facilities for single parents. Many Zen temples to this day have a day care facility on the grounds......where priests attend to the needs of young children and their parents.

When I was in Japan I asked Narasaki Tsugen Roshi (a fairly famous Zen Teacher and Painter) to paint something on my book cover. I must admit I was a bit disappointed when he painted a quick picture of an abbot's stick, and then wrote "what ever is in front of you is your practice". Time has brought me the eyes to appreciate the teaching.

One can talk about Zen practice as if how you sit, how often you sit, or when and where you sit meditation is the practice. This is not what Tsugen Roshi was pointing to. In Japan if the monks are sitting and a visitor arrives, one monk who's job it is to take care of guests..jumps up from his zazen and goes to make tea and welcome the guest.....(temples are tourist attractions in Japan..there are frequent guests.)....after all the guests questions are answered, and all that they can see that the wish to see has been shown....and all their needs attended to, the monk returns to the schedule of activities with his or her fellow monks....such a receptions would be rare if you happened into an American Zen Center during a meditation period. If you are sitting meditation, and a guest arrives in front of you...your practice is to take care of the guest. If you are engaged in the schedule in the monastery, and a typhoon hits your community, you go and help rescue the survivors, and bury the dead.

Now we come to the hard part........you do not need to go looking for typhoons and guests. Perhaps they are someone else's practice right now. What is here now arising in front of you is your practice. In my case trying to teach a six year old some values for her life is my practice. Children without food in the world might be someone else's practice but in my case my five year old (last year) asked what she could do for other children who did not have food after seeing something on TV about hungry children....She made some crafts and donated over $300 to the heifer project last year...she gave a little more to Oprah's angel network where the children in question were shown. I did not go looking for do gooder projects to ease my mind while I lived what in most countries would be a life of luxury (even though I am well below the poverty line in this country). It arose in front of me as something that needed to be done...it became my practice for that moment. I should completely attend to this task that arises before me in this moment to the best of my ability. This is Tsugen's message. This is the real Zen practice that he was speaking of...it might not even involve sitting meditation....lol.

If you are married, then your marriage is arising before you..it is your practice. If you are a parent, then that is arising in front of you and that is your practice. One should not sit in the the temple in New Orleans calmly meditating as the storm blows, and the sewage rises all around you ..not just in front of you. If it is your job to build levees against some future threat...that is your practice too...if as a husband wife or parent, this moment requires planning for the next moments then that planning too is your practice.

Tsugen's message was that there is enough right in front of you....you need not hurry down to the bookstore to seek a practice. Nor travel off to far away places (unless you are told you will need to by your teacher so you can get some old bald guy to write on your book cover a mesaage you will need to share years later.......oh I guess that is part of my job....and what arose before me then and now.)

Sometimes even typing long messages in a manner that is antithetical to Zen is my Zen practice........there is another koan...they just keep popping up. Sometimes heading off to a nice Christian group to package food for starving children (the most effective program in the area) is my Zen practice. Sometimes wrapping presents to help a Sheriff help my child to put smiles on other kids faces is my Zen practice...even if it has nothing to do with Zen, it has everything to do with Zen.......Zen is famously full of such paradox. If you are going to fool around with Zen you better get used to it.

Be Well

Fudo

Not knowing?..What if you feel you know in a social or political situation?

2005-12-07T10:08:00.000-06:00

It is my contention that if you "feel you know"...this is the same as acting like you know when you really don't.
In this day and age many confuse feelings with knowledge and opinion with fact....all one need to do is watch cable news correspondents interview each other when there is nothing to say to see how opinion and impression are confused with knowledge in this day and age.

In politics....all is opinion....and opinion formed without direct knowledge or experience...none of us know.....what happened in New Orleans....unless we were there....and then the most we could have was an impression of a small portion of what happened. Yet in this country we must act (vote) or not act based only on our limited understanding. It is only when we mistake our limited understanding or feelings for fact, and act as those things were fact, that we screw up royally. The best we can have in any political or social situation is partial knowledge. We cannot know..no matter how much we "feel' we know. It is when we tighten down and no longer think about something we "know" that we tighten down our thinking and "we" know better than "they"...and it is in such ideas that war (or any conflict) begins. "We" cannot fight with ourselves...."we" can only fight with "them".

I know many people who feel that abortion is wrong. They voted for President Bush because he was "Pro Life"...now they are very frustrated with him because even though he has a majority in both houses he has not passed any "pro life" legislation. They felt he was good for their cause.....he said he was for their cause...just as rabidly has they seemed to be.....yet nothing has been done. What could have been done?...there opinions differ of course...and what would effectivly reduce the number of abortions assuming that such a thing could be done?....no one really knows. I know literally no one who is pro abortion...all agree it is at best a terrible solution to a difficult problem...but it is as old as sex and reproduction. I find nothing more amusing then men with opinions about abortion.....men do not even have to know there is anything to abort unless women choose to tell them...there is nothing a man can do to control abortion...short of restraint....and then only on an individual basis....(I suppose we could tie all women down permanently so they cannot have access to a coat hanger or a crochet hook..but even the most pro life voter would not go for that one). Perhaps this idea of "gaining control" is behind men's obsession with abortion..but the truth is ......it never has been nor never will be something men can control. Yet it drives political choices in this country....President Bush is president largely because of people's (men's most particularly) feelings about abortion. Interesting isn't it? The one thing we do know about abortion is that it has always been around.....we can guess it always will be around....how we "feel" about that .....well that is what becomes politics......politics is about feelings...not about knowledge. When we mistake feelings for knowledge....then we tighten and become smaller...when we can seperate what we know..from what we feel...we can begin to open up and become more tolerant of others.

In any social situation we can at best know only half of what is going on. If there are more than two ...we know even less.

Yet we must act in social and political situations. If we act in a closed foregone conclusion manner out of "knowledge we feel we have"...we act differently than if we act because we must act even out of our profound ignorance.

The truth of our lives is that we are all profoundly ignorant in most situations...when we know this and act accordingly we act in a kinder more open and more tolerant manner. When we can be compassionate to ourselves about the profoundly true state of our own ignorance, we become more compassionate to others who act out of their own profound state of ignorance. When we are aware of our own ignorance, it ceases to poison our every activity....(ignorance is one of the three poisons Buddha spoke about.) Often there is little we can do about our ignorance...all we really can do is apply the antidote to the poison so it does not infect our every breath. We can only not know.(that which we cannot know)

The antidote to ignorance is not to ignore even more...... the antidote to ignorance is to know it is the the essential truth of our lives, and to act out of the knowledge of this essential truth...in essence perhaps the only one thing we can truly know. If you act out of the compassion that arises from knowing this essential truth....then the world will indeed become a better place....not matter how you vote, or how you choose to act in this particular social situation.

So do not strive for a knowledge that you cannot have. Do not spend your time seeking that which cannot be. There is no knowing enough...there is no final knowledge. There is not really any permanent knowing...at best we can remember at this time how little we really can know...and act out of that intimate knowledge (when we can remember it )....and liberally apply the antidote to the poison of ignorance in our every breath.

This is why I say do not read books......this is why a Zen blog like this is really the antithesis of Zen. No knowledge you might gain from a book, or from a list or a blog will do you or the world one whiff of good until you begin to apply the antidote to your own ignorance in the world about you. No amount of seeking, nor amount of reading will give you anything but the ultimate ignorance you already own. ....do not read...do not rethink...do not solve...do not philosophize.......only don't know...and solutions appear.

"Between the sharp and dull witted there is no distinction".....Eihei Dogen.

Be Well,

Fudo the ignorant.

Those who were left Behind

2005-09-06T10:40:00.000-05:00

I have been watching the news coverage of the disasters that were started by Hurricane Katrina.

I must admit that as I watched the confused responses that the government made I was very angry with certain political officials who had diverted funds, or moved departments around,or played golf or a guitar while New Orleans drowned. I was angry at those officials who left so many people behind.

There was talk of those who did not go, to those who could not go....and how no one seemed to care. At first I was angry at those who left these people behind....then after a few days of cursing the administration I realized that these people that were still in New Orleans had not just been left behind in the last few days by a callous government administration. These people had been left behind a long time ago....they had been left behind as children when they entered school, they had been left behind when there was training for good jobs, they were left behind when they were too old or too ill to be of use to us..they were indeed left behind by a callous administration but they had been left behind by all of us long before there was a storm in the gulf.

Many of us speak about the rising tide that lifts all boats, but we forget not all of us have boats. If we are going to mouth such cliches it is incumbent on us to make sure each and every person has if not a boat of their own,at least a berth on a boat somewhere.

While it is nothing but a crying shame that it took so long for the government to respond to this crisis, (I know it makes me comfortable that the government could respond so well to a crisis they did have five days notice of), it is even more of a crying shame that in the richest country in the world there were people without the means to even get out of the way of an oncoming blow. We have people in the country who we have left without the ability to even duck. They were not left behind in the last years or months ...they were left behind decades ago. They were left behind by Buddhists as well as Evangelical Christians, they were left behind by liberals as well as conservatives, they were left behind by women as well as men...they were left behind without a backward glance by each and every one of us long long ago.

I know it is naive to believe we can end poverty....but poverty is a relative thing.....there need not be people in the richest country in the world who do not have a way to leave if disaster is coming with five days notice. The poor will always be with us a wise man once said, it is also true the foolish will always be with us. Some will be too foolish to leave property in order to protect their lives, but I must point out that too is the result of a culture that says you are what you own, what you can consume is all that matters, and a man is a person who wears the latest fashion, not a person who makes good sound decisions for himself and his family and friends. A woman is someone who looks good floating face down in the muck, not someone with sense enough to move her children to high ground when the water is rising. The poor should be given drugs to keep them quiet so we do not have to think about leaving them behind rather than helping them to have some minimum standard of living ..it is ok for insurance companies to rip them off, credit card companies to loot them, rental agencies to overcharge for very little, and now even their ability to insure a car so they could drive out of New Orleans is based on how long it has been since they payed their Visa card who so generously offer credit at 30% plus interest and of course very reasonable late fees and other charges.....then if they could buy a car and insure it ...the police are 10 times more likely to stop them and ticket them in an old car that they can afford than those a new one.....and Us?... We are just glad that these things happen to "those people".... The poor in California payed for the energy rip offs of Enron to a much greater degree than those who were rich.....we hear often about the poor people who lost their pensions when Enron failed....but not a whit about the poor who had to pay the power bills ...and that made them late on their credit cards, and that made them not be able to get a decent place to live...or even a way to get to work. Shame on us....shame on all of us...all of us who were just glad that it was not happening to us ......yet. In our rush to take care of us and those we consider ours, we have left innocent children and babies behind to drown. We have left the old and ill behind to rot in their wheelchairs. Shame on us.... Shame on all of us.

The problem for us should not be that in these days of disaster we cannot ignore the cries of children who have lost their mothers, or mothers who have lost sight of children the rest of us lost sight of long ago. We should not have to seek who to be blaming for those that were left behind. There should not have been one person left behind...not this week, not last, not in the decades and years before this disaster hit.

As Buddhists we vow to save all beings....the vow is not to move forward faster than the slowest one....to be the last to enter, not the first. We should not be righteous in our anger......the failure is in each and every one of our hearts.

Be Well

Fudo

Our mind and our perceptions

2005-08-26T10:55:00.000-05:00

The mind can effect how we percieve this moment. Here is a personal story from my pre-zen days. My eldest daughter was about eight at the time...we had a cat that had had kittens..we told here she could keep ONE...she selected the littlestone...it was cute....she had a kind heart and always was for the underdog...shortly after all the others had found a home the little kitten sickened and died....she cried like only an eight year old girlcan when she is devastated. Circumstance required we go to off to an activity that was work for me and play for her. As soon as she was down to the sniffling phase we left home and headed off.....I could see trouble coming as I saw a dead cat ahead on the road. My daughter said "look Dad there is a poor dead squirrel!"....on the return trip the dead animal was still a cat for me and a squirrel for her. It remained on the road for several trips...it was always a squirrel for her and a cat for me...It was a life shaping experience for me....a direct point to the power of the mind to shape perception....for her it was just another poor dead squirrel..one among thousands she has seen. From this moment forward I knew that what we perceive does often does not bear much relation to what is...especially if we come to it with unfinished business from the moments before. I worked with mentally ill people who had all kinds of what I thought of as misperceptions....they just did not tally with consensus reality. From this moment forward I had a glimpse into the lying nature of perception....the power of the mind to shape the reality in which we live. I had some greater understanding of the effects of hallucinations and their effects on the mental stability of an individual. I found a key that allowed me to talk to the mentally ill as if the voices (which for them were real) were in fact real for me too....and much progress was made....for both the patient and myself. When I came to Zen, perhaps "only don't know" was easier for me....because I already understood that perceptions and the mind could lie so strongly we ourselves (the little voice in our head) would not even know about the lie. There is little faith in the words of a known liar. I still did not know how to come to the moment without all the stuff I was dragging with me, and I still did not know how to live when we really don't know....but the first was already present when I came to sitting. This is I suppose one of the reasons that "take care of this moment" is so important...even if it sounds so simple and logical...be responsible...finish your business...do not try and short circuit those things that will not let your mind settle...let them come up and go...if they do not go...take care of what ails you...get rid of all that baggage so you can come to the moment free of all that crap as soon possible.....until you can .....you really are just stuck with the mind that is polluted by all that history of misperception. Trying to drive a polluted mind into the moment by forcing it to focus on breathing or forcing it to gaze at your navel can only be momentarily successful. It is giving aspirin to a cancer patient. Sit..see what comes up and what goes away if you do not attend to it...if something keeps coming up....and you can't let go of it....then here is something that needs your attention....fix it..or fix your understanding of it....or let go of your knowing about it.....if it is doubted it will not have the power to force its way into your consciousness uninvited. At the time of that drive I was sure that I was right.... it was a cat.....and that my daughter was wrong due to the fact that she could just not stand to see another dead cat at the time...these days I wonder which of us, if either, got the correct take on that drive to town. Be Well Fudo

What about studying books for understanding?

2005-08-08T16:04:00.000-05:00

If the goal is to be as open as possible to each moment, then understanding of any sort is a hindrance....it is of course a necessary evil...we have to have some little understanding of what is going on in order to function in our life.. I just to not believe catering to it or creating more understanding is the answer...I would prefer to see people deconstructing understanding. Dropping understanding as a goal, leaving the fine intellectual constructions (which by the way are all by their very nature false or at best only partially true)to cease building them and then to actively tear them down and leave all this as rubble ....to not have understanding as a goal, but to understand that to live each moment is the goal, and understanding is in the way, we need some...but let us keep as little as might be necessary rather than fill our headsso our whole life is lived in some book or fantasy world we create.

The problem is in the givens.....given smaller government is better...why have social service?....I understand smaller government is usually better..but wait...the understanding blinds me to the needs of my fellow citizens and our responsibilities to them. Given we should not kill.....well we should be vegetarian...but what if someone has prepared a meal with meat?....should we let the already dead cow go to waste?....what amount of understanding is going to bring us to each varied moment in our lives with all our resource present? (in what ever condition they are in) ..I am sorry ....each thing we grasp limits us...let us just put down the givens and the shoulds and be where we are.

This being said...some understanding is necessary. If someone gets this idea then how does one go about getting the little understanding they need to get through this life?....the best way they can. Having a teacher is the best way. One should try and do that if they can. Second best is sitting with a group without a teacher and last of all if they have no way (and I mean really no way...not just an excuse for not doing it) then reading a book would be a distant third. I remember when someone wrote to me of the impossibility of finding a group or a teacher...first this had to become possible before they could do it..the understanding that no one was about
was keeping them from seeing the resources that they could bring to hand. The first two ways of gaining understanding will bring you into the reality of your life ..the third takes you out of it ....if one must study, study with your whole being what is there in front of you where as Tsugen Roshi told me .......your practice is. Everyone's practice is what is in front of them. This kind of study is more zen then any book review or book reading.

The Soto shu does not give endless lectures on how to do zazen..a quick pointer and then you are stuck right there with a wall and a lot of time....eventually one does wake up to notice the time slowly passing..inside and outside.....the Soto Shu does not believe in giving you an understanding of what zazen is that you must later forget about....it leaves you to build what ever understanding you need to getthrough the period of zazen......and hopefully there will less to tear later when one learns to be here now.I am inclined to read...reading is a great pleasure that takes me away..it is a great escape...I love it....but my goal is not to escape...it is to enter fully and go through since once I enter fully there is no real need to escape. Too many are looking for a cure for this moment....a fix for what ails them...but right here and right now life is being lived..the only life I have...I do not wish to miss a moment of it...good or bad, happy or sad.

I know people will read and people have a need to understand....perhaps when they sit long enough they will get that understanding is highly overrated. It is impossible for a finite conscious mind to grasp this infinite moment..we are blind and crippled..this is the reality of our lives....but even blind and crippled with no real understanding we can still grow and be life. We can even do it joyously and fully once we get that no real understanding is possible....when we give up trying to do the impossible...we are much less frustrated, angry and upset. When a terrorist bomb blows up and we get frightened and angry it is because
the bomb shattered our delusion that we understood the way London works..we lived in London....we got on the tube every morning and we came home on the tube at night..there were some frustrating things about it..but we knew how they worked and we knew what to expect...then BOOOM..our partial understanding is shattered and we are left with anger that this was not the way it was supposed to be today...but the reality is..this was the way it was going to be today....and it was only the comfort of our misunderstanding that was shattered for those of us not present for the attacks. We thought it could not happen here to day....When our partner leaves us because our understanding of our relationship did not include their understanding of our relationship our illusions are shattered our understanding f our relationship is shattered. There is no way for one person in a relationship to "understand" the whole relationship because they only have access to a part of the information...This is true for every where we are....Fear, anger, frustration....These things fade from our lives once the answer to why? becomes because this is what is.

Rather than study a book with your mind, study what is with all that you are.

Be Well Fudo

on anger and terrorism

2005-08-05T09:56:00.000-05:00

S. wrote >Fudo, I would also like to hear how you have been taught to deal >with anger. It's something that has particularly hit me since the >London bombs (even though I'm 200 miles from London). Lots of angry >thoughts that I am ashamed of came to the surface -I never even >knew >I harboured anger like that. The only way I could avoid them has >been >not to listen to the news. I know, though, that avoiding these >thoughts is not the answer - How does one actually get rid of them >so >that they're not there to rise up again? I have tried to live a >loving life, thinking the best of others, but sometimes it all >seems >to break down and I find a dark and ugly underside to my character >that I would like to be rid of. Any ideas? Do not seek to be a Buddha....do not judge yourself against a standard of perfection...... Be what you are where you are ...it is all you really can do. Sit with your angry perhaps racist thoughts.....do not try and suppress them....deal with them.....look at them .....see what they are for what they are...... fear......are you afraid for yourself? for your loved ones? for your very culture?....good ....you should be.....only from that fear that makes you angry can you really act to change the causal factors of the fear....Do you see a terrorist in every seat on the tube?....good ...there might be one....this is the reality of your life.....it is the reality of my life too.....now how do live when we are not assured of another moment of our life or the lives of our loved ones? We make sure we live each moment of the life we do have...the reality of all our lives is that we do not know whether there will be another breath or not. Being awake to that idea is not such a bad thing. Live each moment as if it is your last, speak to each person as if it is the last time you will see them, kiss your wife as if this is the last time you will have to do it....do this and in a short time you will be thanking the terrorists for enriching your life. You are not a guaranteed number of days.....perhaps it is time you stopped acting like it....pretending there is no rush ..that it can be done tomorrow. If it is important to you you had better get about it...it is the reality of your life. The terrorists remind us of our fear...they play upon our fear.......fix the fear...and there is nothing they can do to you. What are we afraid of?...we are afraid we will die with things left undone.....words left unspoken......that our life will have counterd for nothing.....turn the terrorists act into a benefit for yourself and all those you touch...and you will horrify them beyond belief ......this is what will ultimately defeat the terrorists.......when we feed their children in genuine gratitude for their making our life and the lives of all those around better. There is an old saying that your enemies are your best friends........ perhaps there might be some truth there. Be Well Fudo

growing corn to those caring for an ill loved one

2005-05-30T14:15:00.000-05:00

My old Native American friend used to say a religion that did not grow corn was useless. By this he meant a way that did not feed you when you were hungry was not worth practicing. There are many ways which will nourish the spirit when times are good, but if the way does not help when times are difficult then it is not worth playing with when times are good. It is my contention that the "there is no you" philosophical woo woo zen ...really does no good when your husband or wife is ill, perhaps not to get better. I do not believe handing you a sutra book is enough. I do think that focusing on this moment with your loved one does "grow corn". Understanding the nature of impermanence does grow corn. Having a real life understanding of the nature of pain, and of suffering does grown corn. I know that when my father-in-law was suffering, eventually fatally, from congestive heart failure, my wife found the way did grow corn. She was able to look at what was happening with an eye of patience with suffering. She was able to be aware that this was the moment that she had to fix all the problems with her relationship with her father. She even tried to get her sister to finish all the business that was left before he was gone. Her sister chose to believe that there was plenty of time. I remember the day Anjin backed her father into a corner and told him she wanted him to tell her he loved her. He gave the typical father's response "You have to know I love you". She said "I know but I still need to hear you say it." He paused for a moment then said the short sentence that put so many doubts to rest and comforts her to this day...it was something she needed to hear. Death and illness are a part of life. There are things that need to be taken care of, and responsibilities that need to be discharged. What sounded so easy in the beginning...the in sickness and in health part.... is not so easy when its reality rears its ugly head. If you can stay in the moment even though this moment appears to be heart breaking, I can say with confidence that what it will be is heart healing. If you take care of this moment, with compassion and dignity both for yourself and for your loved one, it will be a source of great comfort in the years to come. No one wants to see a loved one suffer. No one wants to be handed a great challenge. We all want an easy practice with nothing but warm walks on the beach. The reality of a real relationship is that it is not all walks on the beach. I, for one, would not wish to sacrifice a real relationship for the dream of what could not possibly be. Please, do not sacrifice one minute of this, Even though this is not what you would have wished for. When it is over, you will be glad you were there through as much of it as you could take. Remember not to beat yourself up for not being the perfect caregiver, you are what you are...be what you are in this place and moment...even if what you are is clumsy and bungling. Remember your spouse loves you for what you are. Rest when you need to rest. Take a break when you need a break. (eat when you are hungry sleep when you are tired is the old zen axiom). There are no real lessons learned when nothing difficult is happening. This is a time of great challenge and growth, both for you and your loved ones. No real compassion is developed until you are challenged to be compassionate. No real strength is developed until our strength is challenged. No real courage is required until there is something to fear. When my mother passed after decades of senile dementia, some of us were glad her suffering was over. One of my brothers wanted his mother alive even though she could not feed herself or would not want to live with no ability to string two thoughts together. 5 of the six of us came back for the funeral ....one did not. He was one of us who was glad her suffering was finally over yet he could not face the idea of a funeral for his mother. ....funny ... he was always like this...he did not come home for our father's funeral either. He did not come to see her in the home, he could not see her like that. He is not good with death, or illness....even though as a former Marine Captain who served in a couple of wars he is probably more familiar with them than most of the rest of us. I am sure he has attended more funerals and dealt with more death than any of us. When it was this personal and intimate.....it was too much. We understood. It is who he is. He should have been nothing else on that day. We love him for who he is, not for what we would like him to be. Be who you are in this and all moments and the regrets and the suffering will be as small as they can be, both for yourself and for your loved one. If you can do this, the way will grow corn. Be Well Fudo

A little peace and quiet

2005-05-30T14:05:00.000-05:00

One of the things that drives people to the practice of Zen is a desire for a little peace and quiet. Just add a little here somewhere to my life. We all would like a little peace, a little break ...some moments of calm in this storm tossed life. Please..just a little peace and quiet is all I am asking for. Just let me sit down here for a little break, and then I can go back to my life a little refreshed. The problem is peace is just a relative thing. In order for there to be this peace, there has to be a conflict for it to be relative to. We cannot create peace all by itself. The moment we begin seeking peace, we define where we are as conflict. I remember when I was taking some training in crisis management. The instructor asked "when does something become an emergency?"...the answer was when we define it as an emergency. When we begin to seek peace we have declared where we are to be a conflict. A conflict takes two sides or positions to happen. The way out of a conflict is for one of us to refuse to see it as conflict. We must be peace. We cannot get peace granted to us by another. The idea of peace arises in the same instant the idea of conflict arises, because they are only relative states, they only exist in relation to each other. The opposite of war is peace. If we wish to have an end to conflict we also end peace. The way to find what we truly seek, which is an end to conflict is not to seek peace. It is to find what truly is....and what truly is is neither peace nor conflict until we bring these ideas to it. We need to stop thinking in terms of peace and war and conflict and detante. We need to understand that there is no peace without war. Also we need to understand the nature of our life. Everything that lives grows, everything that grows conflicts. The grass is at war with the weeds the weeds contend with each other for the space to grow. The food we eat is finessed from some starving child in India. (either by our government or theirs). Capitalism is conflict by its very nature. The argument is that it is better for children to die in Iraq then it is for children to die here.....conflict. One of the results of peace is stagnation. Death. We must kill at least a plant to survive. So rather than seeking the elusive dream of peace, better to seek a way to be at ease in the midst of conflict. So instead of seeking peace, perhaps what we need to seek is an end to our suffering from what is an essential part of our life. (death too is an essential part of our life). So how do we end our suffering? ..Did the Buddha suggest we ask everyone else to stop conflict to end our suffering from war?...No. Did he suggest we march on Washington asking our government to give us peace?.....No...Did he suggest we ask others to please leave us alone?...No.....He suggested we look inside for the end to our suffering. He suggested the way to end our suffering from all this conflict around us was the eightfold path. I have already spoken about one simple way to bring the eightfold path into the reality of our lives, that is to sit. It is my suggestion that if one is suffering from the actions of another, or the condition of another, one finds their way to the eightfold path. One place easy to find the beginning of this path is the nearest chair. Once your feet have found the path that is right there where you are, then one can step out on the path as it appears before you. When you are on the path, suffering ceases. This is not to say that the world around changes to peace and light. This does not mean no one is sick or no one dies. It simply means when you do the right thing as defined in the eightfold path you do not suffer. Suffering arises from wrong thinking, wrong action, wrong livelihood etc. I would suggest blaming others for our suffering is wrong thinking. I would suggest that railing at life for our misery is wrong thinking and wrong action. I think those who think Buddhism or zazen is an escape from our responsibility for the way we are are wrong. I think Buddhism is the most responsible way there is. The first step to ending our suffering is to acknowledge that our suffering is in fact our fault. It arises from our wrong action our distraction, our ignorance. There is no one else to blame here, and no one else to save us. There is nothing I can do to end another's suffering other then show them a way to find the path. Then they must either walk the eightfold path themselves, or suffer. I cannot drive them to the path, I cannot force them to the path, nor can I suffer over long for their failure to even look for the way to end their suffering. In the end it is our suffering and our pain that defines us. When we give up our suffering we have to give up our definition of ourselves as suffering beings. Some of us are not ready to make that step yet. This is a sad truth. Yet even here when our compassionate heart is breaking, it is not right thinking to wish for different way. This is the way, the reality of our lives is where we have to live our lives. There is no other choice. It is not right thinking to keep looking for a way out, when the only way out is through. Be Well Fudo

A lovely question

2005-05-26T09:39:00.000-05:00

> Hi, so what is the difference between mowing the lawn by a zen > practitioner that wants to do it the best possible way and a non zen > practitioner that wants to mow the lawn in the best possible way? What a lovely question!....let me take a shot at an answer. If in watching the two people mow, you could tell a difference then the Zen practitioner still has a ways to go in his or her practice. If the Zen practitioner saw himself or herself as one iota different than the non Zen practitioner then the Zen practitioner still has a ways to go in his or her practice. If the Zen practitioner thought there should be something ....better or different about how he or she mowed the lawn then that Zen practitioner still has a ways to go in his practice. If the Zen practitioner thought years of practice should make them better at mowing the lawn or tending the garden than a gardener who took pride in his or her work, the Zen practitioner's practice has utterly failed. Zen is nothing special, nothing extra, it gives you nothing, adds nothing, takes away nothing. It should leave no trace. If the way the lawn is mowed stinks of Zen, then a trace is left, and the practitioner needs to mow another lawn. If I was looking for a difference. I would look for the smile. If the smile of the Zen practitioner was exactly the same as the gardener who loved his or her work I would smile. The real difference would not easily seen. It was in the fact that the Zen practitioner was only a gardener for a few moments, and the gardener might be a gardener all his or her life. I would expect that the Zen practitioner would go on to do dishes just like person who loves doing dishes....and then go on to eating just like a gourmet, cooking like a person who loves to cook, and being a father or mother like a person who loves being a parent, and always the smile would be the exactly the same. Exactly like someone who loves exactly whatever they are doing. Now I can hear people saying...but a person who loves to garden,doesn't always smile, sometimes they get angry when a deer eats a plant, sometimes they are sad because a well loved plant is dying. Sometimes love is not enough and things go wrong or fail sometimes gardening can be frustrating, sometimes a gardener might even use foul language........ Exactly. The Zen practitioner would be exactly like a person who loved gardening when they garden, exactly like someone who loves being a parent while parenting, and exactly like a person who loves to cook when they cook.(maybe even exactly like a person who loves to argue on a list when they are arguing on a list).... Not different, not separate, no mark, no trace..exactly the same. You would observe no difference, unless you look long and deep and over time, and cannot detect a difference no matter what the activity is. If the Zen practitioner is a master, you might not even notice why or even if the person seems special. All you will know is that you like to be near them, and that things just seem to work out better when they are around, maybe somethings make more sense. If you are lucky you will catch a little of the disease, and then Each moment becomes loved like it is the thing we love most. Each activity is treasured because right there is where everything that is is.

right view?

2005-05-26T09:24:00.000-05:00

c wrote: > So is imperative to obtain right view otherwise is impossible to see > the advantage of zen. > The question is,does perfect understanding of this come with zazen > and the practice of the paramitas and where does it fit > enlightenment in all this? This is a beginning, Right view?....where have I heard that before??....ah yes..the eight fold path..right view, right speech, right resolve, right action, right livelihood,right mindfulness, and right concentration. It would seem that there are wheels within wheels here..that each one...take right view for example..... involves the application of all the other folds of the path. The same can be said of right speech and all the other folds. The activity of Zazen is one activity that includes all the folds of the path. If you just sit still, all the path is unfolding right as you sit. All we need do is to let it unfold. Zazen is one easy way to include the fourth noble truth in our lives. One easy way to bring the eightfold path into the reality of our lives. If one just sits down to see what is there right now, right view unfolds. If one keeps silence right speech unfolds. If one keeps his or her contract with themselves to sit for a certain time, right there right resolve unfolds. Sitting with the intent to manifest the path in our lives is right action. Adding a practice of Buddhism to our lives is right there a right livelihood, opening ourselves to everything that is is right mindfulness, and of course right concentration is made manifest when we actually do this. Zazen is the enlightenment of the Buddha made manifest right here right now. Zazen is not to develop perfect understanding. Perfect understanding is an activity like zazen. From the first moment you sit down, perfect understanding is beginning to be added to the reality of your life. The differences in the schools are only the entry gate they have chosen to offer. One can enter the path through concentration, or by engaging all your time in right livelihood, or by constantly watching your speech...since each of these folds has the wheel of all the others folded into it. Zazen is the gate that the Zen school offers. We like to think of it as the perfect gate, because as soon as you sit...all the folds are actually made manifest right there in your life. Dogen calls it the universal prescription..the one that works for everyone. We all like to think our way is the best way, but no one way is the only way. When I meet someone else with a different way I am reminded of the shopkeeper who when asked what was the best thing in his shop responded "each thing is best." I guess whatever works best for you is the best way for you. This is the best way I have found for me. I once had an encounter with a monk from another tradition. He was telling me that Zen was not the best way, the way he practiced was the best way and there was a long list of reasons why his way was best. I chuckled and agreed his way was best, but I thought always taking only the best way for yourself was selfish, so I was going to be happy practicing the second best way. I remain happy practicing the second best way. Be Well Fudo

teachings from no teacher *lessons from life (poems)

2005-05-21T16:27:00.000-05:00

"what me defensive?" The best defense, Is a good offense, but no invulnerable fortress, Needs defending. "When the arrow hits the mark" One way to tell when the weakness is found is to listen for The scream of denial. "on the deceit of deceit" The most deceived By the deceitful Is the deceitful. "the beauty of the eightfold path" Every criminal thinks their crime is perfect Every criminal forever fears It was not.

Some little poetry

2005-05-15T12:49:00.000-05:00

Here are some little poems, some of which were written while practising in Japan. "Daikon" Three ways a meal, Three meals a day, Seven days a week. "Zen" Putting on black robes In the dark Every day "Mountains" It is difficult To see there is no mountain While you are climbing it "Mountains" One sees the mountain One sees there is no mountain Which is the greater fool? "Untitled" This soap bubble world Is driven by the wind onto the spear sharp grass "conditions" The fire in the belly The embers in the grass live only so long as conditions permit "Winter" Dry and brittle like raspberries in the winter I too await the coming of spring. "to one who is intoxicated" Smell the rain my Drunken friend tomorrow's pain will never end. "untitled " Speak to me not in the icy blue words of old ashes tenderly laid so long ago beneath the cold black stone Sing to me instead the symphony you have heard in a flash of lightening or tell me what you know of the smell of the coming rain

Ringing True

2005-05-12T14:20:00.000-05:00

When I hear the phrase that describes something as "ringing true" I always think of the Bonsho (large temple bell) at Shogoji Temple in Japan. It hung in a bell tower and was rung with a log suspended from ropes attached to a crossbeam on the bell tower. It took both hands to pull the log back, and one had to time the strike so the bell was returning towards the log as it swayed from each strike. If you did not time the strike correctly, or use enough force the bell would give off a discordant clunk. If you made the perfect strike, the bell would send a beautiful peal rolling down the mountain. At certain times of day the bell was sounded either 9 or 18 times.

The whole time I was there only one Monk sounded the bell perfectly 18 strikes in a row. It was not for lack of trying. Each day there were 2 times a day the bell was sounded 18 times in a row...so for over 60 days and two attempts a day only one time did the bell sound well struck all 18 times. That is less than one in 120 attempts. It sure points out the difficulty of the task. One had to be present and pay attention only to the swinging of the bell and carefully yet firmly pull back on the log and swing it forward in the correct time 18 times in a row. There was also a pattern in that the 9th and 17th ring were supposed to be softer, and the 18th ring was supposed to sound right after the 17th. These softer rings were signals to other monks to begin to perform other tasks. If the bell ringers strikes rang true, or at least in the proper pattern the correct signals would be sent to the other monks working around the temple, and every thing would flow smoothly. If the bell was struck in a discordant manner those monks sitting Zazen might be distracted. (everything in the monastery was supposed to support a smooth and harmonious atmosphere for Zazen). There were also the full bows between each ring to complicate the task.

Each day one of the monks would be assigned to ring the temple bell. We would try our best to send only peals that rang true rolling down the mountain and day after day we would fail. We got so into creating this harmonious atmosphere that people tried to walk silently, and tried not to bump each other in the narrow passage ways.

All our efforts toward making this quiet and harmonious atmosphere would be shattered each day as the loudspeaker system for the village below the Temple would crank up with loud announcements each evening during the second period of Zazen. A nice scratchy voice would chat for a while in Japanese.... I never was clued into what was said. Then came the day the shotgun shells for the scarecrows in the rice paddies started going off at frequent random times throughout the day.

All this happened without a twitch in the effort to create a harmonious atmosphere. Somehow it all worked together...perhaps because it all was authentic. It all rang true.....even those discordant crashes of the bell.....even though the Monk missed the mark, he or she was what they authentically were...just a student monk doing his or her best at a nearly impossible task. ...I will always remember that one day, when every peal rang true and one student mastered that cantankerous bell.

a bell

well struck

rings true.

Be Well

Fudo

Karma goes to sleep

2005-05-12T14:13:00.000-05:00

Last night as my wife Barbara was putting our three-year-old daughter
Karma to bed I was reading a stack of emails that had piled up in my
inbox. My computer is just on the other side of the wall from my
daughter's room. I could hear the frustration in my wife's voice
building and the anguish in my daughter's voice increasing as the one,
knowing her daughter was exhausted, and the other, knowing sleep was
not coming, battled in one of the oldest conflicts known to humankind.

I rolled my eyes as I left the computer and go help out. I entered the
fray as a neutral observer and soon found myself comforting an upset
Karma as Barbara set about the tasks that were demanding her time at
the same time as our child was also demanding her attention.

After Karma's breathless explanation that she was just not tired and
could not go to sleep we began to exchange various ideas about such
wonderful things as princesses and handsome princes, monsters and evil
stepmothers and such things as three-year-old girls build obsessions
around. .She began to calm down. Soon our exchanges became quieter
until they faded
into a silent reverie. Hers, I am sure, was of fairy godmothers and
fancy balls . . . mine was of the wonders of a-three-year old mind.

Then I felt it . . . the death grip on the lapel of my samue jacket.
The desperate grip of a three-year-old on a storm-tossed bed. Denied
the usual comfort of her mother, here was the other familiar thing,
the other rock, she could hold onto and hold on she did. I sat there -
who knows how long? - until her breathing smoothed and her fingers
could be gently peeled off. I moved off the pile of sharp-edged toys
I'd not noticed were under me.

As I slowly backed out of my daughter's now quiet room I finally
understood. This was what it was all about. Just to be there in
everyday life, even with something that was not what I thought I
wanted to be doing. There is where true treasures are found.. I
remembered the roll of my eyes as I left my computer. Silly me. .
.resistance to receiving the greatest treasure of all. One I could
have missed for a discussion of copyright issues or someone's
expressions of their opinions on oneness.

I cannot even imagine the number of moments like these I missed with
our first daughter for things I was convinced were more important.
Tonight, if I had given in to my own desires, the opportunity would
have gone in an instant. Vanished in a flash. And I would have gone on
secure in my rightness, focused on my issues, never having the least
idea of what I had missed.

a birthday celebration

2005-05-06T14:12:00.000-05:00

53 years standing in the cold north wind

even the marrow is chilled to ice

no shaded grave could be more frigid

what is this warm breath that clouds the mirror?

everything old

2005-05-06T13:57:00.000-05:00

plum blossoms leap on to spring branches

the greenest of grass strains toward the cloudless blue sky

the voices of playing children float on the gentle breeze

everything old is new again.

Hoka Hey

2005-05-04T23:01:00.000-05:00

In my youth the times were heady. There was a war to protest, and pictures of dead boys being shown each night on the television news...in living color. We (my generation) had just invented sex and were about to teach the world how to live in peace with one another. All things were possible and we were immortal. What was was going to be forever. I was young, and strong and bright with the whole world at my feet.

We struggled to end the war, the killing, so young men just like us would not have to die in the flower of their youth in an unholy war on a distant shore. A war that was not yet lost, just not yet sanctified. We spit on the soldiers when they came home in our arrogance because they did not understand that we were trying to save them as well as ourselves. We could not see any possible good in young men dying.

In these times I was growing, expanding, and learning every day. I thought the growing would go on forever. Each day I would learn new things, get a bigger picture, know more....be more....understand more.

Then for a while the growing slowed. There was less time for the sex we had invented, less time to read great thoughts, and less time to think them. I found myself learning little things, like how to fix a faucet, or how to lay carpet, or fix a water heater. My life was no longer filled with great issues, instead the issues became smaller. Where was the money going to come from to pay the insurance bill so I could drive my car? The beautiful young girl I married turned out to be less beautiful every day, and well .....the sex was not all that new anymore either. The love that was supposed to last forever ended, and promises were broken, and lovers who had become spouses became ex-spouses.

Great loves were replaced by small loves, great ideas replaced by small ideas, and great strength and endurance was replaced by an ever diminishing physical ability.

All this I could convince myself was just a break....a rest between growth spurts...until the rest became years, and the progress turned into loss. I can still remember the first day I realized I could no longer even pretend to be able to do those things that were so easy in my youth...and that I would never run so easily again, or lift so heavy a burden with so little thought again.

This to was not so hard to deal with...by now I had realized that I was getting older. I could only hope that wisdom would replace the quick off the hip mental shots I used to be able to put on the mark in an instant.

Even watching my mother sink slowly (or not so slowly) into senile dementia was not enough to shake that inborn optimism of youth. I could even deal with the day she could no longer could remember me any longer.....not well..but I could deal with it.

Then, it became clear that that wonderful mind that I thought was me and mine forever was slipping. At first it just took a little longer to retrieve the information that used to to be instantly available. (there was so much more filed than there used to be..no wonder it took longer to find something)....Then there were those moments when I knew I had come here for something, but I could not for the life of me remember what. Then I knew I knew that person's name, but it would not come to me for days after I last saw them. Now if I do not do something the moment I think of it, there is a good chance I won't remember to do it all. All this from the mind that never forgot anything....ever.

These days it has become evident that the end I most feared may well be mine as well. The slow erosion of mental abilities till you can no longer feed yourself or even remember those things that had been most important to you.

I remember when loved the tales of the old west, of the noble savage warriors who rode the plains shouting "Hoka Hey"....(today is a good day to die.) When I was young I could not understand how any day would be a good day to die. Now I understand that there are worse things than dying young.

I remember in the youth of my Buddhist practice the earnest drive to end desire. To stop wanting things. This was always balanced with the ever demanding desire, a counter balance to what seemed at the time endless progression of desires for food, and sex and just plain more. I looked forward to the day when such desires would end. I am not there yet, but I am close enough to see what the end of desire looks like. I will say while I still can be careful what you wish for. There is no more barren a life than a life without desire. Now I wish I could reclaim some of that burning desire of my youth, and only shake my head at those fools that want to prematurely drive themselves into old age and death.

One need not kill desire, desire will end slowly by itself of its own nature.

Now as I look forward to years(hopefully) of dwindling desire, diminishing physical skills, and quickly fading mental abilities I understand that there is no going back, there will be no recovery....and only a long slow decline to look forward to.

It is not real fun waking up each day a little less than you were the day before. Of the possible end of these declines there is not one good possibility to look forward to. As a little of what was you in your prime slips away each day sometimes you carefully look to see what there is left of you, and you wonder when what is left will no longer add up to anybody, much less you. This makes all those young ones who want to kill their ego all the more amusing...you do not need to kill your ego, time will slay it for you as surely as death or taxes.

Either that or war or tragedy of one sort of another will kill it for you in an instant, and you will be gone in the flower of your youth. Each ego dies. In its own time and place. There is no need to try and kill it..the world will take of it in its own time.

Now as I look forward to each day of physical pain of one sort of another..(I have long since ceased to wonder if I will hurt today, and only can wonder where it is that I will hurt today>)..I think back on those stories of the wild west I used to like to read so much. In my mind I shake my head in agreement with those imaginary warriors of the plains. I nod my head in agreement. Today is a good day to die.

Today the sun was shining as I watched my daughter play on the playground. The promise of her youth is still bright in her eyes as the buds begin to leaf out on the spring trees. The sky was never bluer, the grass never greener. *Sigh* It would have been a good day to die.

There is some comfort though, in these old creaking bones. Another lesson taught by those legendary warriors of the plains. Even though today has almost passed, and tomorrow is only a few hours away, no matter what tomorrow brings, it too will be a good day to die.

Hoka Hey!

on being inspirational

2005-04-29T13:44:00.000-05:00

Every so often someone tells me that they find some of my writing
inspirational. They seem to think I should be flattered that they were
so "moved" by my writing. Most often these comments come from people who
seem to want to read something that makes them feel good. I want to ask
"What did that piece inspire you to do?"...I can tell the answer usually
would be "well it enabled me to get through another day of my
problematic life."

If you wish to flatter me, tell me that something I wrote moved you to
do something to fix the problems in your life. There have been several
people who have written me and said something like "I am going to Japan
because of what you wrote"...it might be misguided, but that is truly
flattering. A comment like, "I now sit with a group and have met a
teacher because of what you wrote"....or "I saw what you meant and then
I fixed the problem I had in my life." or "You not only made me think,
but now I do things differently"...now that is what inspirational means
to me.

I am not really interested in writing things and posting them to lists
in order to enable people to continue to live in delusion. This is why I
stopped posting to places where people cannot or will not read what I
post or are not really looking for answers, but rather are looking for
confirmation that they are not really as screwed up as they fear they
might be.

Some cannot understand how I can be so inspiring (read enabling) on one
post and so harsh on the next. They see it as some sort of paradox.
Evidently in their dream of what a spiritual life would be like, they
understand it to mean that all your faults will be eliminated, and only
soft and gentle ideas, and only soft cushy woo woo sentiments will be
felt. Only good and gentle things will happen to you.

I am sure the Buddha felt no pain from food poisoning. Dysentery is
definitely not my idea of a graceful exit. Especially while camping in a
park.I imagine that Christ only had generous thoughts about the Romans
as they nailed his hands and feet to the cross, certainly nothing
unpleasant arose in that situation either. I am sure all those who who
heard "let he who is perfect cast the first stone" were immediately
impressed with the wisdom of the Christ, and none felt embarrassed or
humiliated at the words. The money changers in the temple probably were
singing his praises as Jesus overturned their tables. I am sure Buddha's
child certainly never had one moment of feeling abandoned by his father,
and all those who were kicked out of Buddha's sangha went away singing
his praises as well.

I do not understand this idea that everything has to be said in a way
that no one (usually read "me") finds offensive. I wonder what could be
said if that was indeed the standard. I find it interesting that when I
am talking about how I live or how I have lived people find it
"inspiring" and when I talk about how others live a deluded life, I am
being harsh.

Those who know me know I am harsher on myself than I am on anyone else.
I am less forgiving of my mistakes than I am of anyone else's. The
reason my life is so apparently "inspiring" is because I am relentless
in tracking down delusion and eliminating it, more with myself than I am
with any one else.

I find from experience that it is usually the harsh writing ,the rap on
the knuckles, and the stuff that says "wake up!" that people find truly
inspiring. It is the stuff that brings them out of their head and into
the real world that moves them to actually do something in their lives.
It is when I am straight forward and sometimes harsh that people make
changes, open their minds, and move forward with some true progress in
their lives.

I wish I could just say "hey, you know, maybe you might want to try
something different here next time." and people would say "Oh wow! Why
didn't I think of that?... You are right...we perhaps should not be
changing money for profit in the temple. Maybe we shouldn't be ripping
off the people who come to worship...after all ...my family really does
not NEED all the money I bring home from my daily activity."..I sort of
figure if that would not have worked for the "Son of Man"...it will not
have much of a chance of working for me either. I would imagine if Jesus
had just dropped a subtle word to the wise, it would have been neither
effective nor long remembered.

I do not write posts to make people feel good, so when I get as a sort
of a short hand for "that made me feel good" the words "I found that
piece of writing sooo inspiring!" I find myself less than flattered.
Making people feel good on the road to hell is not really what I plan to
do with my life, sometimes what is needed in order for a positive change
to occur is that the person must become uncomfortable enough with where
they are to wish to make a change. People really feel good when their
lives are working for them instead of against them. If any of my
writing ...sweet, tough or in between causes someone to make a change in
their lives that will indeed make them really feel good for a good long
time, then perhaps I have accomplished my purpose in writing.

I do not write so we can come to the conclusion that based on all the
technical data, and specs the Titanic is in fact unsinkable while the
ship slowly sinks in the North Atlantic...such a discussion might in
fact help us feel better for a few minutes, but we are headed for a cold
dunk in the water unless we look at what is really happening and head
for the few life boats there are. Why were there so few
lifeboats?...because the experts had known the ship was unsinkable..it
was designed to be unsinkable. All reason and logic said it was
unsinkable. When the ship is going down, it is time to stop thinking and
talking about being unsinkable, and time to start learning to survive in
the cold northern sea.

Be Well

Fudo

Just a monk

2005-04-24T22:02:00.000-05:00

Recently I have taken some flack for just being some monk, not a Zen master, not one who wishes to teach Zen on an Internet list and therefor worthless to that list. I do not think I have ever been more highly complimented. One of my fondest memories of practice in Japan was a hot summer day when we were practicing Takuhatsu (ritual begging) in a rundown part of a city, I looked up at the reflection of the line of beggars reflected in a large window of a closed shop. I remember thinking to myself how rare it was to have the opportunity to see monks walking their begging rounds and I was having that opportunity right then, and there was another monk, and another monk, and another monk...Hey that is me!. The moment between where there was just another monk, and when I recognized myself in the window was one of the best moments of my life. The thought of it still brings a smile to my face today. There is nothing I would rather be than just another monk in the long line of beggars. Each monk stands in the shoes of the Buddha, and accepts offerings on Buddha's behalf. I cannot think of a finer occupation. There is no need there to be a Zen master, no quick witted fools to challenge your standing. There is only standing and offering an opportunity to each person who walks past to put a small offering in the bowl of the Buddha. There is only offering the Buddha's blessing on each who stop to make an offering. The big hat hides your eyes, they cannot see enough to distinguish you from any other in the line, you cannot even distinguish yourself from the others in the line. You hold the bowl high enough so you cannot see what is offered, the hat keeps you from seeing who it is that is making the offering. You just hold the bowl and chant the blessing for each offering no matter what it might be..there is no judgment there, no discrimination between offerings. You cannot tell the Zen Master from the Novice, nor the rich man's offering from that of the poorest street fisherman. In that moment is a perfection that transcends everything. All things are just as they should be. If I ever have a student, I would rather they travel halfway around the world and stand for a few minutes of their life in the straw sandals of a monk, than that they read a million books, or that they catch a dozen Zen Masters with a quick witted saying. I am ever so grateful that my kind teacher insisted I do it. If I had a wish for anyone, it would be for them to have an experience like that. I have no wish to be a trained Zen Master monkey responding to each challenge with a witty saying, or with what ever response was either expected or unexpected. I have nothing to teach anyone that can be said. All I could offer anyone was the experience of being just a monk...another monk...in a long line of monks. The funny thing is, every Zen master I met in Japan leaped to the opportunity to put on straw sandals and be just another monk in the long line of monks. Being a Zen Master with students bowing at your feet is nothing compared to being just another monk in a long line of monks. That is why a monk must be forced into becoming a teacher. No one in his right mind would exchange those places willingly. Sad it is that some of the quickest wits will never even understand this simple fact. Call me nothing but a clouds and water monk...I will just smile and shake my head at your foolishness. Be Well Fudo

Link to Sotozen-net

2005-04-23T11:53:00.000-05:00

Here is a link that might be of interest to the readers of this Blogg

Scurrilousmonk

Ask a Scurrilous Monk yahoo group

2005-04-23T11:36:00.001-05:00

Here is a link to the Yahoo Group that I founded. It is a companion to the Blogg so that others may contact me and ask questions and get answers that may be posted to the Blogg

Scurrilousmonk

The Mark?

2005-04-16T12:08:00.000-05:00

On Sat, 2005-04-16 at 07:39 -0700, RS wrote: > 1) Fudos quote: In the Bendowa Dogen states "if perceptions and > understanding are mixed in, then it is not the mark of > verification." > > -- what is this saying? That ones 'attainnment' is fake / > unverifiable > if it is comprised of perceptions and understanding? If so, I don't > get > it... But maybe I'm reading the thing wrong. Little help? > No it is saying it may well be fake...because the mark of verification is not such things. If the mark of verification for being a poodle is having four legs and a curly coat, having brown eyes is not the mark of verification. It does not mean the poodle does not have brown eyes..it just means having brown eyes does not make the dog a poodle. Having understanding and perceptions does not make one a Buddha. Ananda memorized every word the Buddha said. He is the source of most all those Sutras that were eventually written down..The ones that start "thus I have heard" were all remembered by Ananda. Ananda was the Buddha's personal attendant. When it came time to pass the Buddha's robes on to a successor Ananda thought it would be him that received the robe...but it was Mahakashapa who smiled when the Buddha raised the flower that got the robe....Ananda eventually received the robe from Mahakashapa....after he transcended words and knowledge. The mark was not how much you perceive or understand....you had to have more than knowledge...you had to actually smile when it was time to smile...not just know that one should smile at the appropriate time. Perceptions and understanding are not the mark of verification. You might have them, but a master will look at other things for the mark of verification. A master looks at how you do things, how you attend to and take care of your life and the life of others in this moment for the mark of verification. It does not mean you do not perceive or understand, but your perceptions and understanding are not what the master looks for when he or she looks for the mark..the Buddha seal. RS writes: >-- I am seeing how this works. In part it greatly reduces the 'burden' >of maintaining a self-importance. Things that don't go my way, don't >bother me as much, because I don't associate my 'self' with the >previous >wish/desire/misconception. I can say, "those poorly laid plans weren't >mine, just some past fool named Rod -- now that I have to deal with the >pieces, what will this Rod do/plan for?" Lets me get to work rather >than lament ideas of loss... All that said, there is another >temptation >that has been arising and I think you might have actually recommended I >pursue it if I recall, but I suspect because of its decadence its not a >rewarding way to see things.I'd like your and others input on its >effacy >before I give further into it, or swear it off: > My habit of repackaging things into self and other, makes me want to >still point and say THAT is me. Naturally the stuff I point at is >flattering, like I AM Life/ existence/ arising/ thinking/ observing/ >love/ curiosity/ hope etc. This is attractive because I don't see >death >much in those things, and thus it sounds like a nice place to hang my >hat (and also stroke my ego since I leave out the >death/non-existence/stillness/fear/apathy/defeat). I know I shouldn't >deliberately 'choose' where to hang my hat, and just let it work itself >out, but I feel trapped between resisting the egotistic but decadent >lure of being a personification of etneral >Arising/Bodhisattva/Buddha/God/etc. and the alternative of trying to >keep 'knowledge' of the impermanent nature of things in my wretching >gut. >Where is the alternative place? Hang my hat on death with equal fervor >as life? Defeat with equal surety of hope? You are still picking and choosing. You want all the good things to be "you" and all the bad things to be "temporary". The vow to realize all things without exception that is the gatha recited upon arising in the morning that brings the freedom. It is when we do not want to look at death or at illness that we can be blindsided by disaster. When we look at all the things that arise, then all that arise is "me" or "I" arise with all things. All things cause all things. Your life is dependent on the blade of grass your neighbor just cut. The reason you practice immediately ..as if your hair is on fire, is because this moment may indeed be your last. It does no good to become desperate, frantic and run around screaming with your hair on fire..but if you immediately address the problem in a calm and effective manner..the fire will be quickly dealt with, and the damage minimized. The same is true of death. As I pass through middle age I find I do not fear the end as much because I feel I have already lived a full life. I treasure each moment of my life because I know it is fleeting, like a flash of lightening or the dew on the grass. When I fully live and attend to this moment, the next flows freely from the last. When you attend to all the things in this moment fully, you fill your life with the life you live which includes the end of your life. Katagiri Roshi said "Do not think for one moment you will not die."....one cannot fully appreciate the cherry blossoms if one is not aware of their fleeting nature. When you sit down quietly and be in your life right as it is....and attend to all that arises, you end up peaceful...aware of the bitter sweet fact that my six year old daughter will only be six for a year, and then seven. The innocence that is manifest in her at this moment is going to turn to a worldly knowledge before my eyes. Each moment including the moment of death becomes bitter sweet. If my daughters life ends tragically in a few years I will be devastated,but I will not have to say I missed the beauty of it. The days of her life like mine and yours are finite and numbered. It is part of the nature of life that as soon as we are born we begin to die. Part of the sweetness of a stick of gum is that the flavor will soon fade. If we always have a stick of gum in our mouth..the sweetness is no longer noticed. If cherry blossoms were always there, there would not be viewing parties in Japan. It is the contrasts and the fleeting nature of life that makes it beautiful. If we do not look at the tenuous nature of our life we cannot fully appreciate the beauty of our life. If you do not understand that in the scheme of things "you" are a flash of lightening....how can you "know" who you are? If you do not understand that eating, farting, taking a dump, death and being a dink are all part of you...how are you going to know who you are? If you ignore your ignorance how are you going to learn to be wise?....each part of you...the good and the bad, the smells and the mess as well as the understanding and pretty hair style....one must see all to truly understand who you are. To understand that who you are changes when you are "dad" or "employee" or "husband" ..none of these is you...and none of them are not you. How can you relax and be in the moment when you are spending so much time ignoring a part of what is arising in this moment?....each thing....everything....must be noticed....or the bad things will keep ambushing you when you are not looking at them. Right now you are not perfect...join the club. Right now you are learning, you are striving, you are seeking your way. It is a fine place to be..it is the only place you can be because it is, in fact, where you are. So just be there. Just seek. Just learn. Just strive. From these activities arise understanding, and a finding of your way. Soto Zen is about "negotiating the way"....there is no way to negotiate the way if you do not start with where you are. You can only step forward from where you are. You cannot step forward either, if you refuse to leave the place you are. The reality of your life is you cannot stay. Life moves forward whether you want it to or not. The only question is are you going to step into the next moment from a solid place, and clearly and completely enter the next? Or are you going to be drug into the next moment from the stumbles of the last? Are you going to blindsided by the nature of your life because you refuse to look at it? Or are you going to be clear on what this moment is, and what the next is bringing? It is my experience that being drug around kicking and screaming and bouncing off rocks you continue to ignore until they crack your ribs is does not make for a smooth negotiation of the way, or a very pleasant life...if you see the rocks and cannot avoid them, at least you can minimize the damage and slightly smooth the way. If you step forward in calm knowledge of what is.....you have a better chance of making it a smoother journey. You are going to take the journey..how you do it is up to you...I have made my choice, and will not turn to another way because...this way works as promised in my life. I do not crack my ribs very severely, or very often, and the way is much smoother and much much more pleasant. Be Well Fudo

beyond knowing

2005-04-15T12:21:00.000-05:00

I came across an interesting article written by Rev. Issho Fujita of the Pioneer Valley Zendo in the February issue of the Dharma Eye published by the Soto Zen International Center. Rev. Fujita says: "In in most other meditation practice,the issues involved take place within the sphere of knowing and from beginning to end, these methods focus on this sphere. In short, the core of the practice is concerned with the regulation and control of conditions in the sphere of knowing. In that sense they are build on "what-is-known-is-everything-ism" and we can see that there is no interest in a dimension of beyond knowing. With regard to this, zazen doesn't ignore the value of knowing, but the main emphasis is put on beyond-knowing which transcends knowing and makes knowing possible. It is precisely for this reason that no matter what happens within the sphere of knowing, it is all right not to deal with such things with your own thoughts and simply entrust yourself to their appearance and disappearance by simply noticing them. In zazen,it is enough to know that such things appear naturally moment to moment within the sphere of knowing. It is not to have the intention of trying to produce some special condition." This beyond-knowing is what the "only don't know" advocates are pointing to. It is this quest to "know" that is the be all and end all or what Rev. Fujita calls "what-is-known-is-everything-ism" that is ultimately futile. It is enough to recognize there is this beyond-knowing, and then to stop the pursuit of every idea that occurs to its ultimate end, and just let these things arise and pass withing your sphere of knowing without an intent to pursue, to know, to have, to hold,to control,to own,to create or to understand. Dogen tells us in the Genjo Koan "there is clearly a limit to our knowing. It isn't possible to grasp the limitless enlightenment of the Buddha by means of our limited knowing. In the Bendowa Dogen states "if perceptions and understanding are mixed in, then it is not the mark of verification." It is this practice of entrusting yourself to the appearance and disappearance of phenomenon in your sphere of knowing, and just noticing them that is the zazen of which Soto Zen speaks. It is this resting of the mind comfortably for a few minutes, without trying to control, create, or know, or hold or understand any particular thing or state,but just noticing what arises in your sphere of knowing that is "just sitting". One might say "well isn't this just sitting and noticing then?"....if one sits down for a few moments one quickly realizes that one cannot help noticing. Noticing is a part of everything we do, one need not intend to notice. It happens naturally, if we only let it and do not try and control what we notice. It is when we no longer try to drive our mind down one particular track that we can begin to see what it naturally is. We can begin to sense what we truly are. There is a drive within all of us to "know"..to have to hold to control. The reality is that none of us can know, hold or control. There are things that will always be beyond our knowing, beyond our ability to gain or hold, or control. One of the things that contributes to our suffering is our desire to have what we cannot have. It makes our current state of being seem small, confused, treacherous. Welcome to the club. It is only when when we think there is another state (one where our life is stable and in control and we know) that this true state of our being seems diminished. We think if we could only be something else...then everything would be better...we chase better jobs, better homes, better thoughts, until we realize that wherever we go ...there we are. Our life keeps arising in the same state. Rather than chase after noble causes, pure thoughts, and intellectual heights of deception, we just might try living our lives as they are..... Small, confused, ignorant, and treacherous. It is after all the only thing that we can really do. The great Zen Master Hakuin painted life as three blind men on a log bridge...holding hands and tapping their way with their staffs across a treacherous bridge. One mistake and splash! This is what he indicated is the true state of our lives. If one focuses on being what one is here and now, and notices everything that arises in our sphere of thought, no matter how petty or small, one begins to live a life free of restriction and suffering, and can be comfortable in whatever arises in this place. We can begin to see the life we live, rather then looking elsewhere for a dream of what could be. The life you are really living is much more satisfying than any dream, even a dream of something better. Here and now is the only place where you can act to change the reality of your life, and the lives of those around you. If you are not paying attention to here and now, it is pretty difficult to make a positive change in anything that matters. Do not sacrifice your chance for comfort and effectiveness for any dream of something better or any imaginary state of being, even an imagined Nirvana. Nirvana is beyond knowing, it cannot be contained in any knowing. If you know about it, what you know is just not accurate. Better not to chase the lie at all. Nirvana is like Cleveland... even if you ever get there you probably will not care that you have arrived. Be Well Fudo

Cranes

2004-12-24T16:34:00.000-06:00

Nothing fills the sky

Like the call

of Cranes

Will virtue lead to enlightenment?

2004-12-24T16:26:00.000-06:00

Virtue is not enlightening. Concentration is not enlightening. Wisdom is not even enlightening. Again with the enlightening. You are still on the Hinayana track here (what is in it for me to be virtuous?), but even so there is an answer.

There is nothing you can do that is enlightening. There are only things you can do that are enlightenment.

Once you drop the idea that there is a you that is separate and not dependent on all things, that there is a you that is unchanged by the conditions under which it exists, then to be selfish and take care of you is to take care of all the things around the bag of bones your intellect resides in. This is virtuous behavior. There is nothing you can gain by stealing, stealing hurts you as much or more than it hurts the person stolen from. Disharmony at home is disharmony where you and all the things you depend on exist. It is your disharmony even if it is your wife or child that is screaming. The way to make things better for yourself is to make things better for the screaming child. You are not something that exists without the screaming child, you exist only in relation to the screaming child in that moment. Virtue then becomes not a rule that you follow, it becomes a way to take care of yourself. Compassion is not something you cultivate it becomes a description of the way you are in the world. Virtue is not something that causes you to be awake to your life, it is the result of being awake.

The precepts are not rules you follow in order to get enlightenment, they are descriptions of enlightened behavior. The 10 powers of a bodhisattva are not something you practice in order to become a bodhisattva they are a description of the results of acting like a bodhisattva.

You can meditate forever and not awaken to the realization that there is no you that exists without the support of your environment and all things in it, there is no you that does not change as all the things around you change, you are only a whirlpool that results from a rock in a steam, dependent on both rock and moving water for your existence. It would be a good idea for you to take care of both rock and the moving water as much as you can.

You can meditate forever and get up and steal as well. There is no particular virtue in meditation. There is really nothing for you to gain from meditation. It is not something you do to gain something.

A person who understands would not steal. He would offer the thief the moon if he could, because the more the thief understands, the better off the person who had something stolen will be. The more satisfied the thief is, the less that is stolen and the the more satisfied the person stolen from will be and he will have helped all the other victims as well. Sitting down to meditate when something is stolen to gain some calmness does not really help the situation, unless and until you get up and go and take away the thief's motivation for stealing. This virtuous behavior makes your existence better. If you need to sit for a few moments in order to become clear enough to act, by all means do so, but do not pretend that sitting down to meditate all by itself makes one bit of difference to the thief, and if it is all you do, it really will not solve anything even for you the next time the thief returns either. (how many times have I heard "I have sat for years and nothing is any better. I think I have some stability then wham something knocks me off it again and I am back to square one...where is the improvement?...why has it not worked to make me calm, more stable?, after fifteen years I still am just as unsettled as I was when I started" ?) All the understanding in the world will not make it better the next time the thief returns. It is only acting on that understanding in a virtuous way that makes the thief stop stealing. This will make it better for you and all beings the next time he or she returns. This thief or another will return. It is not a matter of "if" it is only a matter of "when". When the thief returns what will you do?...better yet, before the thief returns what will you have done?

Be Well

Fudo

just being in the moment

2004-12-24T16:03:00.000-06:00

One of the things about being in the moment is that it is also often misinterpreted to mean only thinking about the shower you are about to enter, but what if this moment is a moment of planning for your day, your week, or your child's wedding? ..then just plan. Once you can be in the moment, then it becomes a practice to stand up in the moment, (not be blown away by the moment) and finally to take care of this moment (act in a way that is beneficial to you and to all beings...since last time I checked you are also a being).

We all want to be done. We want to get there. but in this case there is the end of this life. When we put it that way there is no particular motivation to finish. Buddha entered Nirvana at the end of his life, just be sure when you seek nirvana you are aware of the prerequisites. "This" becomes the journey, and "this moment" becomes your life. If this moment is one in the bathroom, then just piss, if this moment is on the cushion, then just sit. If this moment is one of confusion and distress, just be confused and distressed. It is perfectly all right to be where you are as you are..this is the freedom you are offered. This whole life journey is a process, and we are all like my kindergarten daughter who thought we all should be able to write our name without going through the process of learning how to do it. Right now you are in the process of learning how to do it, it is a fine place to be. We should not be killing this moment of being in the process for desire for a moment of being at the end of the process. Just do it. Just inquire about the schedule and follow it.

Dogen says the first time you sit, right there the right dharma is manifest. Our practice is a practice of manifesting the right dharma. If in your present moment the right dharma is being in process, then be in process. Relax. Just be here now, wherever here is, including in the bathroom, in the school, on the job, or in your relationship. Take care all of all beings there with you as best you can. Do not fret over a mistake made a moment ago, do not break your arm patting yourself on the back for what you did well a moment ago.
I hope you have met some people who are a step ahead in the process, then you can at least have some faith that the process is one you in fact desire. If this is true then just begin manifesting the right dharma here and now, and in the next moment and the next, and as you practice manifesting the right dharma, eventually your whole life becomes such a manifestation. Just begin the process, and have a little faith in the process. If you bought the idea of process from a book, or from deep dissatisfaction with things as they are, it is my recommendation that you find someone who has some traits you admire. Ask them how they do what they do, then just follow the schedule. This is the function of a teacher, if you choose a teacher where you do not wish to gain what they have...then you have no trust in the process. If there is no trust in the process then there is no ability to relax and undergo the process. (remember the Dalai Lama did not spring forth from a lotus..there was a lot of mud there, including having your country taken away before you even had a chance to rule it as you thought should be done, being a colossal failure as a ruler of a country, and as a result of that failure having your friends murdered and your citizens tortured.)....perhaps before we covet a Dalai Lama-like demeanor we should take a little look at the process and see if we really want to undergo it.

We all see ourselves as capable and smart. We all think we should be able to write our name without going through the process. It would be nice if just because we are capable and smart we could just skip the process of learning. Unfortunately this is not the way it works. Just be in the process of learning..that is where you really are. We should not consider ourselves the bodhisattva, we are the suffering beings the boshisattvas come to aid.

Once a student came upon Katagiri Roshi eating breakfast and reading the newspaper. The student said "Hojo-san, you are always telling us to 'just sit', or 'just write', Yet here you are reading and eating." Katagiri responded, "Yes, but I am just eating and reading the newspaper."

Being a teacher is just another step in the process, do not covet the next step till the time for the next step arrives, the last step (or apparent last step) of the journey is a doozy..I am in no hurry to get there. I, for one, am content with just being in the process. I see no need to pretend I am done, or I am perfect..I am in process, just like everyone else alive today is.

I am not sure what happens when we die, if the process continues, or if it ends, I sure am in no hurry to find out.

Be Well

Fudo

On the Great Poet Basho

2004-12-24T16:00:00.000-06:00

Basho? Basho is a liar.

All poets are liars.

I looked under the paper and in the ink.

There was no frog there.

On Enlightenment

2004-09-15T09:33:00.000-05:00

We often have a mistaken idea about enlightenment. To enlighten is to light up. To shine a light on. Many People seem to have the idea that to enlighten or shine a light on is an active sort of thing. Like shining a flashlight where you hear a noise in the dark. This makes the assumption of course, that the light you have to shine has to be turned on, and directed. Many people are engaged in an attempt to turn on the light.

Zen has a different idea. When you just sit, what you begin to see is that deep inside there already is a light. There is something there that perceives. There is an unblemished Buddha nature inside. Some liken it to a seed, I liken it to a star. In our life we go about actively trying to bury this light in junk that we accumulate. We pile on opinions, experience, knowledge, material goods, responsibilities, fears, impressions plans and perceptions. We try and control the light, and frame it and shape it till it can shine only one direction, we build a box around the light, so it can shine in only one way, and then we try and build another box so it can shine in only another direction and we do this again and again until no trace of that original light can be perceived.

We end up calling this nest of boxes "me", but this is not true. This nest of boxes is something we accumulate and create. If we create it, it cannot be who or what we truly are. Even the inside voice that humms the tune that shapes the boxes is only an accumulation of of debris. This light existed before the baby had language to give voice to the words that it whispers inside our head. It existed before the small voice inside uttered its first word. It existed before the small voice inside our head began to whisper of fear, and inadequacy, and the horrible things that might happen if we just let go of the boxes that contain us.

Shikan-taza is about opening the boxes. Well, more accurately, it is about getting rid of the boxes. It is about putting down the boxes until there are no more and the light that was inside the boxes just shines in every direction. It illuminates all things, like the sun having finally come out from behind the clouds.

Perhaps the idea that we should become enlightened, is just a bad translation. Maybe what the translators should have said is that we must become enlightening. We must become awake to the piling of trash on our original Buddha nature.

Dogen said practice is enlightenment. The whole of the practice that Dogen describes includes a lot more than just zazen. It includes the whole of your day, the whole of your week, the whole of your life. In each moment we must sweep clear the accumulation of debris from our life that covers up and obscures the light. Enlightenment is not some turning on of a light that did not already exist. It is the ceaseless sweeping clear of the debris of life so that the original light can shine on all things, even this bag of bones we call a body. This is why practice is enlightenment.

We must eventually even sweep clean this accumulated idea, and just shine on each and everything that comes to us. We will then illuminate the dark corners, and bring a fresh and healthy nourishing light to each thing and every place we go. We just need to let our original nature, our face before our parents were born, shine unobscured.

Zen, morality and fear of cloning

2004-07-24T14:12:00.000-05:00

Dogen said," To carry yourself forward and experience
myriad things is delusion. That myriad things come
forth and experience themselves is awakening."

So what is this carrying yourself forward?....is this the same thing
as moving forward with no desire?..or is trying to control desire
still carrying yourself forward?...trying to stop desire, or stop
thoughts is not possible....letting even your thoughts and desires
manifest....without following them or needing to "make them happen" or
"understand them", meeting the world without like or dislike, agree or
disagree is this all things coming forth and experiencing themselves.

Dogen again says ,"If the least like or dislike arises, the Mind is
lost in confusion."...So experiencing everything as it comes forth
without this judging or analyzing mind, to experience what arises from
a point before the little voice in our head says it piece on what it
"thinks" about what comes forth...this is what Dogen is pointing to I
think. I see this not as shutting down the train of thought..but
rather more a decoupling from the train...where the train rolls down
the track without the engine pulling or anything trying to push or
stop it...there is just not much attention paid to the train of
thought..what is important is what is happening, not what you think
about it. This is letting the little voice chatter on without being
overly concerned with what it is saying..this requires first, an
experience that allows one to understand that they are not just the
little voice...to get at least one experience of the universe
manifesting itself and experiencing itself without "carrying yourself
forward".....to get to attending to the myriad things coming forth and
experiencing themselves before the little voice editorializes for just
an instant..to begin to understand the little voice is a liar, and it
is not "you"....you are coming forth and manifesting and experiencing
too.

This experience can be from "being in the groove"....where basketball
is just played and you are doing things before you think about them...
I got it first from cross country skiing...where skiing was happening
without the voice...I had gotten so into the skiing that I was not
longer even hearing the little voice..there was no separation between
me and skiing..there was just skiing happening......it can come from
zazen, or a fist, a staff or a shout......it does not really
matter...what matters is once you have the experience, you understand
more about the nature of "you". This is often mistaken for
enlightenment...but Dogen says here that the experience itself is only
enlightenment when it is happening, and carrying even this experience
forward is delusion. One needs the experience of existing beyond the
voice to understand the voice is not them..that they go on existing
even when the voice is silent, and they can "think" or "perceive" on
a nonverbal or pre-verbal level, and even act on this level. They can
"be" on a level that is not limited by the little voice, or even
required to attend to what it is saying...The little voice (verbal
thought). cannot be silenced forever, but it need not be attended
to..unless it is useful, and no matter what it claims..it is not you.
It is this ability to attend to the little voice, or choose not
to..that frees one from the tyranny of the "self" and allows one to
act selflessly.

At the temple the schedule happens (or does not happen) in spite of
whether any sane person would agree or disagree with what is
happening, and no one really cares what you or anyone else thinks
about it...it is one way of forcing one to get beyond like or
dislike...because you either get beyond it or go nuts...usually one
goes nuts first, then gets beyond it.

Right now human cloning is happening. We have no idea of the effects
of this occurrence. It has great potential for good, and could have
some devastating consequences..and like all things, it will probably
not be as bad as we fear or as good as we hope...but once it happens
our only choice is to deal with its reality....whether we like it or
not..or agree with it or not. The idea that we can somehow control it,
or stop it from happening is only delusion.

Be Well

Fudo

The list of bad names

2004-06-04T09:27:00.000-05:00

In my many years writing on internet lists, I have found many folks who claim
some attainment. I have found many people who make great claims to have
reached a state where they are "one with everything", yet they seem to be
seperate from anything negative, or with a negative connotation. They are one
with sobriety, but seperate from a alchoholic, one with wisdom, but seperate
from the mentally ill. They are one with the pure, but seperate from the
defiled. I ask you how you can be one with everything, but seperate from any
of these adjectives on this list? If you cannot claim all these adjectives,
your claim to oneness is just another lie, both to yourself, and to anyone
else you make the claim to. Zen is not about pretending, if you are one with
everything, you are one with all these too. If you see yourself as seperate
from that conservative Christian who turned you off, your claims to
attainment are a lie. If you see yourself as seperate from the child abusing
priest, your claims are a lie. If you see yourself as seperate from the
facist, the dirty, the smelly , the liar or the cheat, you claims are also
just another lie.

There is a old Zen story, about a women who husband is ill, and she sees a
priest walking by, she runs up and asks the priest if he can recite a sutra
for her husband, the preist says he will, then the women asks "well, how can
I know if it will benefit my husband?" The priest assures the woman that a
proclamation of the dharma benefits all beings. The woman thinks for a
moment...."all beings? Would that include my neighbor?" The priest nods in
affirmation. The lady replies "can you say the sutra for all beings, execept
my neighbor?" We all want to include in our oneness only all the things we
like but exclude the asshole who lives next door. It is easy to love all
beings in general, but hard to love the person who cuts us off in traffic. We
all want to believe everthing includes gourmet food, and does not include
shit. That zen is something we have on a cushion, but do not need in the
bathroom.We all want to think that picking tea leaves on a sunny afternoon is
zen, but slopping shit from the septic tank on your pants as you carry it
down the hill in a bucket is not zen. But hey...everything includes
everything, not just the good stuff. This is what happens when things you
think meet the real world. If you cannot react the same to the shit on your
pants, as you do to the tea leaves in your basket, you have no real
enlightenment. The enlightenment you think you have is only in your mind. It
is not real.

If you have a problem applying any adjective to yourself, any claims to be one
with everything are a lie. This is why poking someone who makes the claim
they are one with everything (attained enlightenment) is such a good
exercise, their actions tell you whether they lie or not. It is not just that
they get angry, being one with anger is also necessary. It is when they deny
they are one with something, or someone, that the lie is exposed. It is when
they try and say the are one with everything, but seperate from that bitter,
arrogant, asshole who doesn't know shit from shoe polish, that the lie is
exposed. It is when they stand up and yell that they are not mentally ill,
that the lie is exposed, or when they whine like a wounded dog when they are
poked, that the lie is exposed, but even then, I am not seperate from them,
neither are you.

I have worked for years in the mental health field, and worked with the most
difficult and violent of clients. I have been called every name in the book.
(all these on the list and many more I cannot even remember)..of course you
can call a person any name in the book, and If he agrees he is not seperate
from the name, it will not affect him at all .....he already agrees with you.
If you call a person who makes a claim a name, and they react as if they were
knifed in the gut, the claim to some attainment is false, because in the real
world where things really count, they fail to demonstrate oneness. So go
ahead, call me any adjective you want, just do not think that your label
changes anything anywhere but in your mind., and I would suggest, that for
your own mental health, and your own enlightenment, you be very careful what
and how you change things in your mind.

To those of you who might be concerned for the my state of being, yes indeed I
do think these adjectives apply to me, of course, I think they apply to you
as well. I also think all the other "good" adjectives that you are willing to
accept apply as well, I do not think either you nor I is seperate from any
one of them, although I must admit, there are times I like to pretend the bad
ones do not apply to me as well.

I do see myself as not seperate from the deluded, the confused, the beginner,
or the lost. This is why I am on this list.

I am perfectly happy to own any adjective anyone can come up with.

And now I am off the the monastery. See you again in a few days.

Be Well

Fudo the Closed minded, defensive, smug, ego-ridden
down right angry,Fakir,faker,fool,asshole,idiot, con man,
liar,thief, apostate, heretic, mother fucker, father
raper, murderer, masterbater, moron, drunk, ego
maniac,child molestor, priest, gay, nutless, pussy,
coward, criminal, fraud, lazy, immature, loser, nut,
whacko, loony, liberal, lusty, dominating, fruity,
lesbo, dyke, gonadless, chicken, emasculating, unkind
, rude, crude, stinking, stuck up, sinister, slimy,
insecure, low down, smelly, gutter crawling, lecher,
pig, glutton, whiny, whore, wino, wicked, glib,
weirdo, crazy, cruel, crack pot,insincere,
twit,obstinant , stubborn, son of a bitch,
etc..etc...etc.."

And let's add arrogant, ignorant and bitter

A Poem

2004-05-15T21:18:00.000-05:00

A Caution to the Potter's Apprentice

The sweet nectar that cures all ills
rarely drips onto the sun parched soil
from perfect pots
shaped and stamped with the master's seal.

The thirsty seeds sing the praises
of the cracked pots
rejected from the potter's hand
snuck from the pile in the corner
and put into the rough and tumble of everyday use.

A transcript of a lecture never given, by a person unauthorized to teach

2004-05-15T09:05:00.000-05:00

There is an old zen story, one of Dogen's favorites it
seems...he reffered to it often in his writings...that
goes something like this:

Once, there was a man who loved dragons. He collected
dragons carved in stone.dragons made of wax, pictures
of dragons,plates with dragons painted on them
,pictures of dragons, and anything else he could find
that related to dragons. This man spoke,thought and
dreamed of dragons,one could say he ate, drank, and
slept dragons. One day a real dragon heard of this
man's love of dragons. the dragon thought to
himself,"if this man loves dragons so much I should
stop by and visit him". So one day when the man was
polishing his dragon collection a shadow fell across
his house....the man went outside to see what had
caused this sudden darkness.....when he looked up into
the sky he saw this huge smelly fire breathing monster
descending on his house. The man ran away and never
looked back.

We all have fantasies about the way we would like
things to be...we all create dragon collections, we
imagine what our life will be like.. we think we know
what zen is, what the catholic church is, what
meditation is, what our wife, our child is like, we
create these imaginary dragon collections, and as long
as we are far enough away from our dragons we can make
our collection into anything we like. When confronted
with the real dragon of Christianity we run away...and
make a collection of Buddhist beliefs... when the
reality of our wife arises we can run away and create
an new dragon collection somewhere else .....we can
fall in love with the distant image of Miss
September. If our husband is not the dragon we thought
him to be..why there are paperback books galore we can
collect...full of images of that romantic bastard we
thought we married.

It does not matter what the dragon collection is that
we accumulate,whether we think Buddhism is this pure
and holy safe resting place, or whether we think
meditation is this holy grail of sitting forever in
oneness...sooner or later the real dragon will arrive.
We can run from the nasty infighting of the baptist's
trying to decide whether women can be ordained right
into that Shangra La of Tibetan Buddhism...and as long
as the dragon stays in Tibet...we can pretend the
nasty infighting over the recognition of Tulkus does
not exist....we can run from the corruption and decay
of the Catholic Church straight toward Zen , and as
long as Zen is in Japan ...well its corruption and
decay are also not seen in the shining dragons we
polish on our shelves.

My friends, life is a real dragon. Full of beauty and
ugliness, full of joy and of sorrow, and wherever
there is life there is shit galore. When we meet the
reality of sitting in meditation we find we are tired
sometimes , we are scattered sometimes, sometimes we
can see for a fleeting moment the oneness of all
things then in an instant it is gone again. When we
meet the dragon of Buddhist practice..sometimes the
pieces do not fall all together in the nice order we
thought we would see...sometimes like my personal
experience a beautiful little girl shatters the idea
of long years of practice in a monastery. Sometimes
there are children, sick parents,depressed partners,
sleepy eyes aching joints and just plain no time.
These are the real dragons of Buddhist practice.

The true test of a person of zen, is not how long they
can sit. nor how long they do sit. Or even how great a
collection of the dragons of nice Zen thoughts, or
nice Zen ideas, of moments of knowing they are
Buddhas,or even of good deeds you have. The true test
of a person of zen is just this ......When the true
dragon arrives....what do you do???

What then should one do when a true dragon appears on
their doorstep???

When I was in the monastery I heard that monks were
sometimes called dragons of zen. and some of the old
hoary dragons were greatly feared by the clouds and
water monks (novices). When one of these old dragons
appeared they were greeted like anyone else...hands
together in greeting, a bow, and room was made in the
monastery for them to sleep, they were offered
refreshing drink and food for sustenance and were made
welcome for the time they chose to stay......and when
they left they were given good wishes for their
health, money for travel, and were sent off with
another bow in thanks for the lessons learned while
they were here. Now this is not to say that caring for
these old dragons was easy or that there was not a
great disturbance in the routine of the monastery
while there were there..sometimes time honored rules
that we all had to follow were thrown out the window
to adjust to this new dragon in our midst. The simple
fact was ...no matter the rules......the
expectations..the inconvenience...the dragon was here
and had to be dealt with and it was our job as monks
to see that it was dealt with in the appropriate
manner. We stumbled, we got angry, we were confused,
we made mistakes, but hopefully...with practice...we
eventually developed some finesse at dragon handling.

This I think is how the ancestors of old thought true
dragons should be treated.

So my friends, feel free to show us your dragon
collections....and we will watch to see what you do
when the true dragon arrives. That is after all the
only thing that really matters.

I will leave you with this ..hope... this wish
.....this recommendation from Dogen Zenji:

"Please honored followers of zen, long accustomed to
groping for the elephant, Do not be afraid of the real
dragon."

Be Well
Fudo

link for Soto-zen.

2004-05-14T10:33:00.000-05:00

Here is a link for those interested in Soto-zen.

http://www.sotozen-net.or.jp/kokusai/kokusai.htm

There is some information here on the practice of zazen,
some links to publications of the Soto-Shu, and list of
Soto temples both in Japan and around the world.

Be Well

Fudo

Occam's Razor

2004-05-14T10:04:00.000-05:00

Occam's Razor:

"One should not increase, beyond what is necessary,
the number of entities required to explain anything"

This medieval philosopher's logical principle is the
underpinning for all scientific models. It is a razor
used to cut away any explanation that concocts some
complicated structure or unnecessary conditions and in
the end leaves one with the simplest solution. Occam's
razor says the simplest explanation is the best.

Occam's Razor is particularly useful in developing
universal models because it forces the modeler to cast
off complicated schemes and leaves the modeler with
the simplest explanation that satisfies the
conditions.

A thousand years before William of Occam postulated
his razor the son of a king in what would one day become
India, lost his way. He tried to find a way to end the
suffering he saw around him in his life, the suffering
he felt in his life. He postulated a simple way to end
it, proved it and to this day no one has failed to
replicate his experiment who tried honestly to apply
it.

Around this simple formula more books have been
written then on almost any other idea(the Buddhist
canon is the most extensive of any religions). It has
spawned a thousand sects and schools and mutated its
canon many times as it passed through countries and
cultures. This tradition has grown and spawned
hierarchies of gods and demons and hells and heavens.
All of wich may be cut away as unnecessary by Occam's
razor..we can go back to that simple original formula
that no one in two thousand years has been able to
pare down...Buddha himself said this was his
teaching..everything else is just trying to explain
it.

1.every living thing suffers.
2.suffering is caused by desire.
3.suffering can be ended.
4.the way to end suffering is the eightfold path.
a.right understanding
b.right aspiration
c.right speech
d.right action
e.right livelihood
f.right effort
g.right mindfulness
h.right concentration

It is a simple formula that has been discussed for two
thousand years and books and shelves of books have
been written on what exactly is the right way of doing
all these things.

We can end up with endless discussions and
dissertations on right speech..and on right livelihood
and if we can keep these discussions going on long
enough we may never have to actually do them.

I say cut the bull crap. You do not need anyone else
to tell you whether your occupation is a supporting an
uplifting one..you know in your heart if it is true or
not. You do not need some priest to tell you if your
speech is helpful and sustaining to others.You know in
your heart whether this is true or not.There is
nothing stopping you from listening to that small
voice inside you that knows what is right....unless
the chatter of your ego overpowers it. ...so ...just
sit down ..and listen.

I do not care if you face the wall or
not..unnecessary..cut it away with Occam's razor..Soto
or Rinzai?..cut it away...Tibetan or Vietnamese? cut
it away...clergy or lay person?..cut it away..pare it
down ..cut it away ..leave only the simplest
explanation left....God or no God?? *snip*...good or
evil?? *snip*..stick or no stick? *snip* Christian or
Buddhist? *snip* no money? *snip* sick? *snip*
teacher or no teacher? *snip*

If we only would stop burying our own inborn knowledge
of how to end our suffering we would all have the
tools to end it here and now.

When you know it is not good..do not do it.When you
know it is good do it...no excuse, no delay...or put
another classic way ..Do all that is good, do nothing
that is evil...I do not think it gets any simpler than
that.

Apply the technique of modern science..use Occam's
Razor to figure out how to live your life without
suffering.

Hey..do you know what?..when you cut away all the
cultural trappings..I do not think there is one
religion, postulated by any saint or prophet that
would not agree that the formula left from Occam's
razor would be a good way, a healthful way,a healing
way, to live your life.

I cannot believe some people think science and
religion cannot work together. It works for me.

Be Well

Fudo

On gradtitude

2004-05-14T09:17:00.000-05:00

Dear A***,

If I have what it takes...boy what a challenge...lol.

I have a poem about this that I wrote a while
ago....it may not at first seem to apply ..but maybe I
can explain it.

The Doshi lead a magnificent ceremony,
but the Buddha on the alter remained
unmoved.

I do not know about you..but I have people expressing
their gratitude to me quite frequently, I usually find
it embarrassing. I look down and scuff my shoes in the
dirt and mumble something like "... it was nothing".
People who have benefited from some action I have
taken feel a need to express their gratitude. I am not
sure how this works..or what need it fulfills..but I
am pretty sure it does not greatly benefit the
receiver of this gratitude. The person we are grateful
to has already received the benefits and costs of the
action we are grateful for, and is probably not really
in need of our expressions of gratitude.

This being said, I often find myself struck by
something that makes me just stop and do a little bow.
This bow does benefit me. It is a physical action that
recognizes the wonders around me each moment...and is
a tiny ceremony that helps to put me back in harmony
with what is happening. ..It is a tiny acknowledgment
of my at least momentary awareness.

I remember when I had to learn the procedure for
offering water and rice to each alter in the
temple...well not each alter..but only certain
ones...and each one had a particular cup and bowl that
had to be set out and picked up at a particular time.
The water at one time..the rice at another. I remember
running around the temple with my tray of water cups
trying not to spill a drop and still get the rounds
made before the time allowed was up....and wondering
what in the hell I was doing. It seemed particularly
silly to me..and I had so many better things to do.
What good would it do the statue? What a joke. I would
have benefited much more from a little nap then I
would from this ..and the statue needed the water not
at all. When I got home...I did not offer water every
day...it seemed a little silly and unnecessary.

Then I read somewhere what someone wrote of the time
of Dogen's death. Dogen's Jisha was so lost and
grieving when the master passed that he did not know
what to do ..the whole temple was in shock..what to
do? how to do it...the poor lost Jisha just kept
bringing tea and cakes to the teachers
grave..delivering and serving just as he always
had...he did not know what else to do. Dogen no longer
drank the tea..he no longer ate the cake. The little
ceremony did not help the master on his way..nor aid
his rest in any way..the little service helped the
Jisha remember and feel close to the master that
helped him on the way. It recalled a time when the
master was there to answer the questions, and whack
the fools, and helped the Jisha remember what he had
been taught at those times. It gave the Jisha the
opportunity to start his day just as he always had,
and to feel a comfort and ease in his role in the
world. The Jisha served the tea and cakes till the day
he died. His fellow monks took up the task because
this demonstration of dedication had meaning and
comfort for them. I am sure this Jisha was not the
first to make such offerings..I am sure Ananda had the
same reaction when the Buddha passed. We do not do
this because the Buddha needs our offerings, we do it
because it eases our grief, it connects us with those
who got the opportunity to serve the Buddha some rice.

After hearing this story..I began to serve the water
and rice again. Not because I was grateful to the
Buddha for his teaching, but because I wanted to put
myself in harmony with those who had gone before, and
served in their turn. I am sure they also did not
always serve in gratitude, I am sure some days they
were tired and angry, and resentful as well. I do not
serve a bowl of rice to give something. I am not so
egotistical to think anything I could do would benefit
the Buddhas. I serve the rice to get something..the
something those who served had..that must be renewed
each moment.

Now I am a Priest. It is my job to make ceremonies and
offer incense. I do the ceremonies not because I will
move a statue..nor speed Buddha on the way to
somewhere he already got. I chant and bow and serve
the people so we can get in harmony with the place
we are, in the moment we are there. So we can create a
place and time where grief is comforted, pain is
eased, good times remembered, and good people are
imitated.The service is not for the Buddha it is for
us. When I bow it is not in gratitude, it is in
humility. I understand the innumerable labors that
have brought me to this moment, and that my virtue
does not deserve it. I bow because I cannot stand. I
cannot hold up the universe on my shoulders..I have
lost...I am beaten. There is nothing else I can do. My
bow does not benefit the statue on the alter..It
benefits me..it brings me into harmony with what truly
is.

Sometimes I feel grateful for the lesson, sometimes I
feel pissed that I lost again. Sometimes the I is no
longer there and there is no gratitude or anger,no
grief or no peace. It does not matter what I feel when
I bow, it does not benefit the Buddha that I bow. When
I really get a glimpse of the way thing really are I
have no choice..the only response I have to the
overwhelming truth is to bow. If I am not really in
the groove and my samadhi has fled in the face of some
storm or another, I can make a bow and remember the
times I bow as I should. I can get some of the same
feelings I get when I have to bow. I can use my
physical being to put myself in a posture that reminds
me of that samadhi, and maybe find my way back there
again. I doubt the Buddha cares if I bow..but I do.

When I bow I am not bowing to ..I am bowing from. I am
bowing from the realization of the overwhelming truth
that the whole world and everything that ever was has
supported the efforts that have brought me to this
moment. If there is a statue in front of me it
represents all these labors..all the births and deaths
and joys and sufferings that have brought us to this
moment. I bow because I cannot bear the grief, nor
dance a dance that expresses the joys, nor carry the
burdens, nor put them down.

So keep your gratitude. The Buddhas and Ancestors do
not need it ...what an ego to presume we had anything
to offer them anyway. We must wake up to the situation
we are really in ..and bow because we cannot
stand...bow before we fall and hurt ourselves. That is
our only real choice.

Be Well

Fudo

On the practice or non practice of Takuhatsu

2004-05-14T09:10:00.000-05:00

(written in Sept 2003)

I spent some time in that last couple of days doing
ritual begging at the Renaissance Festival here in Mn.
I made my morning rounds for about an hour and a half
before the festival opened. I felt this was an
important practice that somehow didn't make it across
the Pacific Ocean. I had heard all the "problems" with
bringing this practice to the west..westerners were
different, begging is viewed differently..we do not
want to seem like Hare Krishna's ...begging has a
different meaning here we do not want to seem to be
bag ladies.. ...and on and on a list of excuses for
taking a pass on this unimportant practice ...zen is
all about zazen after all. My histories tell me the
reason that we put work into the monastery (and hence
seshin schedule) was that the Chinese did not respond
as well to begging as the Indian people did so the
monks had to work to grow their own food. It is
interesting to me that these are the same excuses the
Japanese Priests used for not making some begging
rounds. Some of the monasteries still send out their
monks to beg in the streets on a monthly or weekly
schedule , and I had found it an important practice to
me when I was in Japan...more in harmony with my
spirit then sitting still endless hours ..and
wondered if it could not be done here in the west as
well. This has been a practice since the first days of
Buddhism, and I wondered what was different today that
made it impossible here. So I thought I would just
give it a chance and see what happened.

I picked the festival because it is a place where
artists and craftsmen gather. It is a place where
something a bit different would have a chance to be
encountered for what it was...I thought I might get
some chances to teach something to some folks and that
did indeed happen. What I did not expect was what I
would learn by putting out this encounter with the
wider world.

I got basically the same response we got in Japan
right down to the same average contributions per hour.
I got the same reactions from the cringing because
they seemed to expect a bolt of lightning from the
sky, to extreme gratitude for someone taking the time
to bless their business. I got one very negative
reaction which was less then the number we got in
Japan. I found the ratios of reactions to be virtually
identical..not at all what I expected to find...about
as many folks knew what was happening as those folks
in Japan did. I was walking along thinking the
divisions between east and west did not seem so big
and thinking about how down deep we are more alike
then we think when I noticed something else.

I noticed that though I made the same offering of a
blessing, the same chant at each booth..the reactions
fell along a bell shaped curve...some were really
happy..some were really unhappy to be caught in this
little unexpected drama, most fell in the middle. Some
were generous, some were timid ..some were
cheap...some came boldly forward and some hid behind a
curtain and peeked out. In each case my offering was
the same..what was different was what their reaction
to it was...I came to realize that those reactions
were just a moment of how they react to the world...I
was offering this experience ...if they were blessed
it was because they had already been blessed...If they
were uptight...it was because they were that
already..what I was really offering was an interaction
that either confirmed their generous and open nature,
or strongly pointed out their grasping and cold
approach to the world...the blessing were already
theirs, or would not come from me..they needed to open
up to accept blessings or let the good things pass
them by. I was offering them the chance..and whether
it was received or not had nothing to do with me.

After the many remarks about how grateful the
merchants were for the blessings of their shops....I
began to realize something else..this performance of
service and connection to the larger community has
been cut out of most of the practices that have made
the crossings..the offering of services, begging
rituals, festival rites, social activities and
services in times of disaster.. all have been left out
of many centers in the west ( I would say most but
that is an opinion and not a fact I know) It did not
seem to matter much to these folks if they called
themselves Christian, Druid, Pagen, Buddhist or
Muslim. The most frequent response was that they could
use all the blessings they could get,and gratitude
that someone took the time to come to them and offer
them something that they did not even know they
lacked. I had to tell folks that no I could not come
back to them tomorrow because the practice was not to
discriminate, that each booth was to be visited in
turn...none passed and none doubly blessed..It did not
matter if I liked or disliked the shop owner..whether
I had heard the stories of their depravities or their
good works..I must visit each one in their turn, and
then go on to the next one..I had to promise that I
would not quit..and make another round when I could
get finished with visiting every shop...I still have
about a third of the booths to visit next weekend
before I can start around again.

I cannot not count the number of people who bowed to
me on my busy morning rounds, each bow I returned with
a warm feeling in my heart. My lower back is sore
tonight...I have not bowed so much to so many in a
long time.

There is a buzz in the community..something
happened..something different..that got everyone to
thinking about blessings, and faith, and what is
important to them...one person asked me about practice
opportunities and I directed him to a center in his
neighborhood..one person discovered a connection to my
wife because they had a mutual friend who practiced
for a while at my teacher's temple. People had
questions..they now had someone they knew to ask. I
answered questions on such various topics as where to
buy a hat like that..to how to make my sandals....to
deep and penetrating questions about the differences
between Buddhism and Christianity.

I earned enough in an hour and a half each day to have
purchased my food for the day , and to secure a modest
place to sleep for the night...about the same amount
in relative terms as the monk's in Buddha's sangha did
2500 years ago in a land very far away (and maybe not
coincidently about the same amount we earned with the
practice in Japan). I will give this money to my
teacher in gratitude for teaching me about this
practice..he will use it to help build the temple that
will be our offering to the world.

I do not know exactly what will be the effects of what
happened ...but I do know something happened...and
something profound started to flow around, to, and
from one old fat monk stepping out in funny straw
sandals and a big round hat.

I did not ask anyone to become a Buddhist or if they
were a Buddhist..I did not ask any one to sit. I did
not ask anything from anyone..I just put out a wish
that the Compassion of Kannon Bodhisattva be upon this
place and those who come here..over and over
again...and held a bowl for people to put something in
if they wished. ...and before someone tells me this is
not a Soto practice...I will have to tell them that
this is indeed a practice still performed at Eiheiji
and Sojiji..the head temples of Soto Zen Buddhism..the
temples founded by Dogen Zenji and Keizan
Zenji..considered the two founders of Soto Zen in
Japan (I know not many westerners have heard of much
of Keizan Zenji..his writings are not as sale able as
Dogen's) This is a practice at the two head temples
that each Soto Shu Priest must visit to be "abbot for
the day" as part of the Dharma transmission
ceremonies. For one day each Dharma Transmitted Soto
Priest must preside over these temples that have this
practice as a part of the schedule. This is a practice
that has been part of Buddhism since its first days,
and was practiced by Dogen from his first days in a
temple.

We just don't do it here.
...because...because....well...I don't know why.

Maybe cowering in our Zendos pretending it is a good
thing not to take the practice of Buddhism out into
the world is really what Dogen and Keizan had in
mind....but then there is this little nagging
thing....why did they put on their sandals, pick up a
bell, hike up their robes and head out to bless the
homes and businesses of the people of the towns at the
bottoms of the mountain paths?

Be Well,

Fudo

Facing fears

2004-05-12T14:19:00.001-05:00

Today my five year old daughter faced her greatest fear.....the dreaded waterslide. We have been swimming at a club for years, she has swum since she was two.....when she was about two, she began using the waterslides, she got scared one time, and would not even sit at the top any longer. My wife and I had tried numerous times to get her to go again, sure that once the fear was passed she would enjoy the slides again....but no go, offers of bribes of favorite toys, favorite meals out at her favoritie family restaurant, but no go....many talks about facing your fears, and the importance of not letting fear control your life, but no go. The top of the slide would induce such panic and fear, that we lost heart in trying to get her to become more accustomed to is, and thus less afraid of it. We gave up trying for a while to get her past her fear.

I do not really know what made today different for her, there was nothing special about the day, the old prompting to try the slide had rested since last fall with a few joking references over the winter...almost every day we swam in the pool with barely a look at the slides crouching there at the deeper end of the pool.

Today I just offered that if she wanted to go to Burger King to get a micropet toy, I could convince her Mom to take us there for lunch...if..she went down the water slide. We had a bit of negotiation, an attempt to do somethinkg a little less scary in order to get the desired reward, and when it became clear that only the waterslide would do, I made the offer,maybe Mom would go down with you if you wanted to go.....There was a new lifeguard on duty, who apparently did not know the rule which forbade going down the slides together, as other parents were sliding down with their children. A quick point at the little two year old girl going down the slide with her mother was apparently all that was needed for the bribe to take effect, enough courage was mustered to be able to make at least one attempt, with the safety of Mom of course, to ease her through the most scary part..the noisy waterfall at the top of the slide.

It was amazing, I do not know if it was more amazing to me then to her, but she loved the slide, up and down...over and over ..all by herself ...then finally upside down and backwards...she was invincible,elated, free at last from the one fear that limited her life for the past three years!.A simple little demonstration about what happens when we face our fears head on, with the support of those who love us, the elation the freedom on the face of the child has not faded yet, she is still dancing while she puts on her little ballet shoes and prepares for dance class.

Some fears, like this one perhaps, protect us when we are too small, or too weak , or too vulnerable to do what we fear. All I can say is when we can trust and let go of all but the supporting hand of our loved ones, and step into that which we are most afraid of, we find a freedom in our lives that is worth the risk.

Sometimes I think about how scary it must be to be five, to have kindergarten, and school buses, and growing and grown up life awaiting just around the corner, it is my hope that we all can find the courage we once mustered on our way to kindegarten for that first day of being on our own for the first time in our life. It is my hope that each of us can find the courage that we once must have had, and in reconnecting with that courage, we can manage to face that which frightens us here in our grown up world, and in doing so find the freedom to be who we are.

Be Well

Fudo

on only don't know

2004-05-11T23:30:00.000-05:00

Dear W**,

I think you are trying to make "only do not know" into non thinking.....one
can be in a state beyond thinking, the" thinking about non thinking, how do
we think of not thinking?, beyond thinking" that Dogen speaks about..this is
different then not knowing, although one would probably not know when they
were beyond thinking. I am speaking of a more simple "not knowing" that has
nothing to do with being beyond thinking...it is quite simply being aware
that you really do not know what is going on in situation as it expands
beyond your awareness, and yet here you are, and you must act (or not act) in
the place you are without really being able to understand what is going
on.....when we lack the information we feel we need to be "correct" sometimes
we hold back, or act rashly, because we do not know what to do, but the truth
is ..."we" (our concious mind) never really knows all that we need to make a
complete and correct response. We simply do not know and cannot know all the
antecedent conditions or all the consequences of our acts, even our
compassionate ones...will the person who's wounds we bind go on to kill
millions? Who knows? Will the child we walk past be the next Buddha? We do
not know...and cannot know. We can only make a response on what information
we have, and it is always incomplete. ...So rather then try and know, or wait
till we can have enough information so we can feel we know, perhaps with
just a bow to the fact that we do not know...we can take our best shot
anyway.

I do not know whether vegetarianism is in fact a more compassionate way of
eating then eating meat, I do not believe anyone else "knows' either. So not
knowing allows me the freedom to look at each choice that comes to me and act
in each situation which way I think seems best at the time, to eat the
veggies in my bowl, yet be free to eat the Doctor's gift of meat for monks
he felt were lacking in proper nutrition, for my
health and the health of my fellow monks. If I "knew" vegetarianism was
"correct" then I would be hindered in this situation, and taken out of the
moment by my hinderance, If I "knew" eating meat was correct, then I might
have another reaction to my daily meals of the same vegetables over and over,
and again I would be taken out of the moment. Not knowing frees us from
being bound to our concepts, it does not mean we do not have concepts, it
just means we know that even though not eating meat might be our best guess
as to a "correct" way to eat, we are not stuck in this concept when a
situation that might challenge our thoughts or our beliefs comes up.

My computer screensaver says "So desu ka?"...Japanese (in romanji) for is that
so? This question, posed by a long ago master is for me the essence of not
knowing......when I think.....only don't know is all we need.....my
screensaver might pop up and say "Oh is that so?"

No, I do not know if "only don't know" is the best way, or the only way, or
all that anyone really needs, but it is the most freeing way I have found so
far to allow myself the ablility to be flexible and respond in any way
required to the apparent requirements of the moment. It allows me the freedom
to make a response that I hope in the end will be compassonate for both
myself and all beings in any situation I find myself in, I have found that
when I give myself and others this freedom, what occurs is a compassionate
response. (at least an apparently compassionate response...I guess I am not
sure that I would even know a compassonate response if I saw one).

Be Well

Fudo

Is the goal of practice to have a disciplined and open mind?

2004-05-11T23:22:00.000-05:00

I could care less what adjectives you put in front of your description of your
mind while you practice, what matters to me is if you can be there.(ooh we
are really disciplined and open now....we really have accomplished
something...) If you can give a drink to the thirsty, hit the mark, make a
difference. I could care less how disciplined and open your mind is ..or how
loudly your monkey mind is chattering. A conductor does not care how
beautiful you think the music is..he just wants you to hit the cymbals at the
right time...you are in the orchestra, the performance is not for you, but by
you...how much you appreciate the order of your mind does not matter a whit
to the audience. What matters to us is if you can hit the mark...not what
you think about while you hit it. If you need reason to hit the mark fine, if
you do not fine, just bang the damn cymbals when the time comes, and quit
trying to dazzle us with your footwork. It is just a distraction. We are
trying to listen to the music you are too busy thinking about to be making.
....just hit the damn cymbals....leave the why and wherefore and discipline
and openness to those who are just watching the show. Listen to me
now....one two three clang...one two three clang....one two three
clang....first you just do it....I mean ..how hard is that? what great
understanding do you need to do that?...you do not need a music education,
or to be able to complete the unfinished symphony before you play the
music...all you need to understand is one two three clang....why can't you do
that?

Too many yeah buts and the concert is over before you even bang the cymbals
once and you missed the whole thing again, and you did not contribute at all
to the music of the spheres.

Oh I think I have it now...you want to be the conductor, (or have the
conductor's understanding) before you learn to bang the cymbals....I mean who
wants to be just another member of the percussion section?....well you got to
learn to play an instrument before you can lead the orchestra.......why not
start here?...one two three clang.....at least you would be contributing
something to the music of the spheres......which is more then all the yeah
buts (and the people standing in line for the one conductor position) in the
world have ever done. We have a conductor (Buddha) we do not need another
one..we do need someone to bang the cymbals though...are you ready yet?

Maybe if you just count one two three clang throughout the whole symphony the
openness and discipline will arrive all by themselves.....without a thought
or effort in their construction...you might just gain the makings of a real
musician as well, instead of just being a musical prodigy in your own mind.

Yeah but:
" My original point was that disciplined reasoning does have an
important role in Buddhist practice and study. "

My point still is disciplined reasoning just gets in the way of learning to
play the cymbals in the orchestra. I could care less about your lofty notions
of practice and study.......I would rather you just banged the cymbals at the
right time...at least you might actually gain some skill doing that.

In the temple in Japan they did not care if I undersood the sutra we were
chanting in some foreign language...I still had to learn to to bang the
mukugyo in time to lead the chant, and ring the bells a the right
time.....you have to be right there to do that........hmm you mean the
banging might be more important then the understanding?....wow ...who woulda
thunk? Maybe you have to be right there in the moment in order for the
openness and discipline to have a chance to form.....then you have a chance
to understand the sutra.

Maybe once you have played the music, it become easier to undertand what the
composer was creating. Maybe the understanding is just something extra. Maybe
just being the music is enough.

Be Well

Fudo

Metaphors and Images

2004-05-11T23:07:00.000-05:00

Dear J****,

Hey! ......You point to one of the major difficulties of just reading Zen
literature. Most of us lack the cultural background, the context if you will,
to get the metaphors that are written about in the old Koans and stories.(not
to mention the difficulty in getting words that have been translated not
once...but four or five times over the years. (I have seen the same koan in
two different sources translated as "If you come with a stick I will give you
a stick", and "if you come with no stick, I will give you a
stick"....opposite indications ....opposite metaphors, both most wisely
interpreted by masters who have read them .....which is correct? ....I am not
wise enough to know.

We also often tend misunderstand the nature of the stories, I remember when it
was pointed out to me that often these stories, were an interaction between
two people who's feet were firmly on the path, rather then between a person
who was enlightened, and one who was not. The dramas are events between two
people which often were engaged in an attempt to break though someone else's
impediment.

Sometimes even on this list, two people who know, are interacting in a drama
to show something to the others on the list. (Al are you there?), and
sometimes they are two people refining their own abilities to walk the path.
(potatos in a sack, knocking the clods off each other)..... As I said in a
recent post, when you get it, it does not mean you never make a mistake
again....it just means you begin to see things in a different way....I think
it is fair to say that Buddha's opinion on the status of women was a mistake
on his part....even enlightened he was not a god, but still a man....this is
not a religion that makes gods of men, or women, it merely completes our
humanness. We are, like Shakyamuni, still limited by our time and place in
the world, this is why we seek a master to interpret the writings from his
understanding based on a time and place (a cultural context) that is closer
to ours, and therefore has some insights to share with us that we can have
the context to understand.

I remember the moment I caught out of the corner of my eye, a teacher running
back to his room to get his bessu (white socks used in memorial or special
services). ...as a trainee, I was expected to have my bessu whenever they
were needed. It was a part of the training to know when they were needed.
This person was a teacher, lecturing us on Dogen, but that did not make him
perfect, unable to miss a mark...it just meant he knew something I did
not....my teacher was often still in the bath while others were waiting for
him to perform a ceremony...I remember laughing at my fellow trainees who
were at a loss what to do, it is not proper respect in Japan for a person
lower in rank to tell a person of higher rank what to do (he is right even
when he is wrong....I am wrong even if I am right)......if we waited for
him..then that was our job.....but he was not coming, and if this went on for
too long then the whole schedule would be messed up...I would chuckle when
feet began to suffle in discomfort as my fellow trainess struggled to find a
way out.........eventually I (not caught in this cultural dilemma) would bow
to my tan (seat in the meditation hall) and bow to my fellow trainess (each
caught in a dilemma they had no way to resolve) and go and get my teacher out
of his bath, help him dress and get to the sodo where every one was waiting
for him....He spoke limited Japanese, and often did not get the drift of what
was going on either..he needed me to help him just as I needed him to help
me. His enlightenment had not conveyed an all knowing, perfection on him the
transcended culture or time and space.....and neither would mine to that for
me, Buddha's did not either...if you have a doubt.....think about Buddha and
women. That is the beauty of this way, Buddha was a human being, not a god.
We can be that too.

Be Well

Fudo