With palms together,
Good Evening All,
Our Zen is not a sit on your butt and do nothing Zen. When we sit on our butt we are doing something; we are being buddha-nature. When we stand. we are doing something, we are standing buddhas. When we are walking, we are walking buddhas. When working we are working buddhas. So our Zen is a Zen in motion. Our Zen is a pure form of being in this world, not separate from it. Our Zen is Buddha himself.
No wobbling allowed. We exist in the world. We see something. We do something.
To do without thinking requires a clear mind that sees clearly what is there. It requires a complete union with buddha-nature, There is this, there is that. They are the same. An I-Thou of the infinite.
Compassion comes naturally to those who live in the world. When we live outside of the world, compassion is much more challenging. Living in the world, we see, feel, taste, smell, the suffering of others. We suffer with them as we are with them. Living outside the world, in our thoughts and feelings and assumptions, it is easy to make judgments about others, others' actions, in-actions, values, attitudes, etc. We see them and ourselves as different, somehow separate from ourselves.
Our practice must take us into the world, deeply into the world, where we exist in the same space as all beings. . When we exist in the same space, where is there room for difference? Where is there room for judgment? So, when we exist in the same space we exist in the clear world of nothing added.
Be well,
Organ Mountain Zen
Wednesday, December 21, 2005
Wednesday, December 14, 2005
Hero Zen
With palms together,
Good Morning Everyone,
Yesterday was a challenging day for us here in Cloudcroft. Dharma Mountain Zendo sits next to a log cabin tucked up on a mountain. Friends of McGuire-roshi's and ours, who live in El Paso, own this delightful little cabin in the woods.
The day before yesterday, Ken and Fern Roshi were leaving the zendo to go to Alamogordo. As they passed the log cabin they noticed a car with a trailer was just leaving the cabin with a bed and other items. They called our friends in El Paso and discovered no one was supposed to be there. Ken Roshi chased the car and blocked it at a cattle guard. But the driver, a woman in her 40s, slipped around him in her car and Fern Roshi jumped out of thei car and ran across the meadow to block the driver. The driver refused to stop and ran over her as she stood in front of the oncoming vehicle.
Our friends from El Paso came up, they called us yesterday afternoon to help.
We immediately drove over to the Zendo. The Sherrif was there. Fern Roshi looked horrible. She is bruised and cut all over her body. Our friend's cabin was practically stripped of its contents and our friends were very upset.
We sat and talked about feelings for sometime. It was good to get these things out. What does it mean to be robbed? What does it mean to be almost killed trying to stop a robber? How do we proceed? What is the role of each of us as friends? We all sat there in the living room of the Roshis' living quarters talking.
In the meantime, the Sherrif got a tip that there was an antiwque store in Alamorgordo that might have some of our friends items. Ken Roshi, my wife, and our friends climbed into our truck and we drove down off the mountain to the store. As we approached the stotre, sure enough a red rocking chair that belonged to our friends was right thee for sale on the front porch of the store!
Practically 80 percent of the items in that store were stolen merchandise. There were other victims there with lists of their lost things identifying them. One such person wanted to beat the you know what out of the woman thief.
It is so rare that stolen items are found. My wife and I have been burglerized several times in our life together. It is an awful feeling to come home to discover someone has broken into your home, looked through your personal things and stolen valuables, often items with great sentimental value. None of our things were ever recovered. Situations such as these certainly clarify our relationship to our precepts. They also give us grist for the mill in working through our relative attachments to things, as well as to our faith in our own security and ability to live without hindrance.
As of last night, Fern Roshi seemed to be OK. She refused (in her stoic manner) to go to a hospital for evaluation, but she was very sore indeed.
In the end, at least this far into the end, the thief has been caught, much of the stolen property of several unsolved burgleries recovered, and all is well this morning.
Today we must pack up the Refuge and get ready to close it for the winter. In the morning we will be moving down to Las Cruces. There is so much to do. So, we will just do one thing at a time until it is done.
___
I very much appreciate the discussion on the Yahoogroups' ZenLiving list surrounding the Williams execution. My personal sense is that the issue of redemption clouded the question of the propriety of the State taking life.
My question is, how is it possible for those who take the Three Refuges, and the Three Pure Precepts, and the Ten Grave Precepts, all of which are about relieving suffering and being a buddha, to sanction killing a human being coldly and without mercy?
And secondly then, what is an "appropriate" punishment for a convicted murderer?
Be well all,
Good Morning Everyone,
Yesterday was a challenging day for us here in Cloudcroft. Dharma Mountain Zendo sits next to a log cabin tucked up on a mountain. Friends of McGuire-roshi's and ours, who live in El Paso, own this delightful little cabin in the woods.
The day before yesterday, Ken and Fern Roshi were leaving the zendo to go to Alamogordo. As they passed the log cabin they noticed a car with a trailer was just leaving the cabin with a bed and other items. They called our friends in El Paso and discovered no one was supposed to be there. Ken Roshi chased the car and blocked it at a cattle guard. But the driver, a woman in her 40s, slipped around him in her car and Fern Roshi jumped out of thei car and ran across the meadow to block the driver. The driver refused to stop and ran over her as she stood in front of the oncoming vehicle.
Our friends from El Paso came up, they called us yesterday afternoon to help.
We immediately drove over to the Zendo. The Sherrif was there. Fern Roshi looked horrible. She is bruised and cut all over her body. Our friend's cabin was practically stripped of its contents and our friends were very upset.
We sat and talked about feelings for sometime. It was good to get these things out. What does it mean to be robbed? What does it mean to be almost killed trying to stop a robber? How do we proceed? What is the role of each of us as friends? We all sat there in the living room of the Roshis' living quarters talking.
In the meantime, the Sherrif got a tip that there was an antiwque store in Alamorgordo that might have some of our friends items. Ken Roshi, my wife, and our friends climbed into our truck and we drove down off the mountain to the store. As we approached the stotre, sure enough a red rocking chair that belonged to our friends was right thee for sale on the front porch of the store!
Practically 80 percent of the items in that store were stolen merchandise. There were other victims there with lists of their lost things identifying them. One such person wanted to beat the you know what out of the woman thief.
It is so rare that stolen items are found. My wife and I have been burglerized several times in our life together. It is an awful feeling to come home to discover someone has broken into your home, looked through your personal things and stolen valuables, often items with great sentimental value. None of our things were ever recovered. Situations such as these certainly clarify our relationship to our precepts. They also give us grist for the mill in working through our relative attachments to things, as well as to our faith in our own security and ability to live without hindrance.
As of last night, Fern Roshi seemed to be OK. She refused (in her stoic manner) to go to a hospital for evaluation, but she was very sore indeed.
In the end, at least this far into the end, the thief has been caught, much of the stolen property of several unsolved burgleries recovered, and all is well this morning.
Today we must pack up the Refuge and get ready to close it for the winter. In the morning we will be moving down to Las Cruces. There is so much to do. So, we will just do one thing at a time until it is done.
___
I very much appreciate the discussion on the Yahoogroups' ZenLiving list surrounding the Williams execution. My personal sense is that the issue of redemption clouded the question of the propriety of the State taking life.
My question is, how is it possible for those who take the Three Refuges, and the Three Pure Precepts, and the Ten Grave Precepts, all of which are about relieving suffering and being a buddha, to sanction killing a human being coldly and without mercy?
And secondly then, what is an "appropriate" punishment for a convicted murderer?
Be well all,
Monday, December 12, 2005
Executions
With palms together,
A week or so ago, a Vietnam vet was executed. I think he was the 1000Th person killed by the state since the Supreme Court lifted the ban on capitol punishment. Tonight another vet will be killed, though he is a different sort of vet. He is a veteran of the streets. A killer, gangster, no doubt. Perhaps reformed, I don't know.
War does funny things to people. Hell, life does funny things to people. We pride ourselves in our ability to understand our world, learn from our mistakes, grow as a culture, and yet, here we are, living out vengeance.
These executions should cause us to at least take a breath and pause for a moment.
What are we doing?
Retaliation, it seems to me is a mark of a primitive mind. It is criminal behavior. It is what we expect of gangs and barbarians.
An eye for an eye, people say. Really? When was the last time the state blinded a person or knocked out his tooth. Jews made it nearly impossible to execute someone when convicted. But this "Judeo-Christian" society? Gosh, we have had a thousand opportunities to show mercy and in each case turned away.
We need to keep society safe. Right. And killing people does that? Are we really keeping society safe? Who does the death penalty punish? The one executed or the executioner? Is there a difference? Who really could cast the proverbial first stone? What is the moral foundation of this ethic?
My sense is that we diminish ourselves greatly through state sanctioned killing. But then we are not really a civilized society, are we? We pretend. We talk the talk, but abhor the walk. We like to look civilized. But appearances are truly deceiving.
Civilized societies take care of their ill, their elderly, and their poor. Civilized societies do not execute children. Civilized societies do not poison the atmosphere for the sake of a few dollars more to add to the already excessive profits of oil companies. Civilized societies do not sanction the possession of handguns, nor do they need them. Civilized societies provide funding for research to cure lethal illnesses, regardless of who is ill or how they became ill. Civilized societies teach their children and each other how to love. Civilized societies cherish peace, life, and liberty.
We can do better than this. We must.
As we are all one, including the executioner and the executed, I ask we each recite the prayer of atonement for ourselves this evening.
Be well,
May All Beings Be Free From Suffering
Sodaiho Roshi
A week or so ago, a Vietnam vet was executed. I think he was the 1000Th person killed by the state since the Supreme Court lifted the ban on capitol punishment. Tonight another vet will be killed, though he is a different sort of vet. He is a veteran of the streets. A killer, gangster, no doubt. Perhaps reformed, I don't know.
War does funny things to people. Hell, life does funny things to people. We pride ourselves in our ability to understand our world, learn from our mistakes, grow as a culture, and yet, here we are, living out vengeance.
These executions should cause us to at least take a breath and pause for a moment.
What are we doing?
Retaliation, it seems to me is a mark of a primitive mind. It is criminal behavior. It is what we expect of gangs and barbarians.
An eye for an eye, people say. Really? When was the last time the state blinded a person or knocked out his tooth. Jews made it nearly impossible to execute someone when convicted. But this "Judeo-Christian" society? Gosh, we have had a thousand opportunities to show mercy and in each case turned away.
We need to keep society safe. Right. And killing people does that? Are we really keeping society safe? Who does the death penalty punish? The one executed or the executioner? Is there a difference? Who really could cast the proverbial first stone? What is the moral foundation of this ethic?
My sense is that we diminish ourselves greatly through state sanctioned killing. But then we are not really a civilized society, are we? We pretend. We talk the talk, but abhor the walk. We like to look civilized. But appearances are truly deceiving.
Civilized societies take care of their ill, their elderly, and their poor. Civilized societies do not execute children. Civilized societies do not poison the atmosphere for the sake of a few dollars more to add to the already excessive profits of oil companies. Civilized societies do not sanction the possession of handguns, nor do they need them. Civilized societies provide funding for research to cure lethal illnesses, regardless of who is ill or how they became ill. Civilized societies teach their children and each other how to love. Civilized societies cherish peace, life, and liberty.
We can do better than this. We must.
As we are all one, including the executioner and the executed, I ask we each recite the prayer of atonement for ourselves this evening.
Be well,
May All Beings Be Free From Suffering
Sodaiho Roshi
With palms together,
Good Afternoon,
We are preparing to leave the refuge for the winter months. We have leased an apartment in Las Cruces and will be moving there next weekend. This comes as a sort of acknowledgement, I suppose, that we are not interested in dealing with the harshness of the mountain winter this year. There is a freedom that comes with this decision.
I would like to talk with you a little about this freedom.
Our thinking, as I have suggested to you before, often gets in our way. We all too often over-think things, stumbling this way and that, in our effort to get things right. And sometimes the thinking gives rise to great fear, greed, or hatred: the poisons that paralyse us or push us to do and say that which we would not otherwise do.
In the Zen tradition, we try to think in terms of "right" or "correct" thinking, action, speech, and so on.
Correct thinking is that which allows us to do what the situation call for. To have correct thinking, we must "see" as clearly as the moon reflected on a still pond's water. When we have a clear mind, it reflects exactly (and only) what is there in front of us, with nothing added. We then know what to do. We call this correct undederstanding.
Incorrect thinking is that which gets in the way, distorts, poisons, or otherwise disturbs us. It gets in our way and often causes us to wobble along, uncertain of what step to take next or in what direction to take it.
With correct thinking, when we are sick, we see a doctor. We take our medicine. This includes all forms of sickness: physical, psychological, spiritual, and emotional. When depression comes over us, we see a doctor. We take our medicine. When we feel alone and without connection to the heart of the universe, we go to our Three Treasures, the Buddha's example, the Buddha's Teaching and our Friends. We take the Buddha's medicine, stilling our mind, refreshing our heart, and centering ourselves.
Likewise, with correct thinking when the dog barks, we naturally let him out or feed him or otherwise tend to him. If our children break something, fail to acknowledge us, or in some other way 'bother' us, we pick up the pieces, accept them, forgive them, love them, and easily go to the next thing before us to do.
Complaining is "something added."
Complaining, as I so often do, can be a way of letting out the steam we are building in our heads with incorrect thinking. Sometimes it is good to let out the steam. Sometimes not. If others are present,m silence is better. Better still is not having the steam arise in the first place. That is our practice. That is our work to be done each day.
When we live this way we are living completely free. Just there. It is in this that we can see that the true shackles are those we create in our minds.
Be free.
May All Beings Be Free From Suffering
Sodaiho Roshi
Good Afternoon,
We are preparing to leave the refuge for the winter months. We have leased an apartment in Las Cruces and will be moving there next weekend. This comes as a sort of acknowledgement, I suppose, that we are not interested in dealing with the harshness of the mountain winter this year. There is a freedom that comes with this decision.
I would like to talk with you a little about this freedom.
Our thinking, as I have suggested to you before, often gets in our way. We all too often over-think things, stumbling this way and that, in our effort to get things right. And sometimes the thinking gives rise to great fear, greed, or hatred: the poisons that paralyse us or push us to do and say that which we would not otherwise do.
In the Zen tradition, we try to think in terms of "right" or "correct" thinking, action, speech, and so on.
Correct thinking is that which allows us to do what the situation call for. To have correct thinking, we must "see" as clearly as the moon reflected on a still pond's water. When we have a clear mind, it reflects exactly (and only) what is there in front of us, with nothing added. We then know what to do. We call this correct undederstanding.
Incorrect thinking is that which gets in the way, distorts, poisons, or otherwise disturbs us. It gets in our way and often causes us to wobble along, uncertain of what step to take next or in what direction to take it.
With correct thinking, when we are sick, we see a doctor. We take our medicine. This includes all forms of sickness: physical, psychological, spiritual, and emotional. When depression comes over us, we see a doctor. We take our medicine. When we feel alone and without connection to the heart of the universe, we go to our Three Treasures, the Buddha's example, the Buddha's Teaching and our Friends. We take the Buddha's medicine, stilling our mind, refreshing our heart, and centering ourselves.
Likewise, with correct thinking when the dog barks, we naturally let him out or feed him or otherwise tend to him. If our children break something, fail to acknowledge us, or in some other way 'bother' us, we pick up the pieces, accept them, forgive them, love them, and easily go to the next thing before us to do.
Complaining is "something added."
Complaining, as I so often do, can be a way of letting out the steam we are building in our heads with incorrect thinking. Sometimes it is good to let out the steam. Sometimes not. If others are present,m silence is better. Better still is not having the steam arise in the first place. That is our practice. That is our work to be done each day.
When we live this way we are living completely free. Just there. It is in this that we can see that the true shackles are those we create in our minds.
Be free.
May All Beings Be Free From Suffering
Sodaiho Roshi
With palms together,
This morning is the 8th day of the twelfth lunar cycle of the year: rohatsu. On this morning the Buddha looked up at the morning star and had a profound realization. He clearly saw that all things in all times are one, of one substance, interdependent and infinite, eternal, and always changing. But then he stood up and took a long walk.
He didn't go anywhere. There is no where to go. He was simply present, fully present with whoever he was with and in each moment, there was no difference between he and they. He saw clearly.
We know from his example and from the multitude of buddhas, before and after, that this kind of present moment living is possible even today. With practice and right understanding each of us are buddhas. Some of us are buddhas-in-waiting, but all of us are already buddhas.
As we take our next step into the new year please avoid making big plans. Have a place and live within it as fully as you possibly can: seeing clearly, tasting clearly, smelling clearly, feeling clearly, perceiving and thinking clearly everything just as it is with nothing added. This is our way.
On my calendar this morning it says:
Bring me a pearl from the bottom of the sea without getting wet.
What does this mean? If you read the words and get stuck in them you do not understand. What pearl? What sea? What does it mean "to bring"? What is "getting wet?"
When we understand this is not about thinking, not about words, but rather about correct action, then we are on the path. Our lives become actual expressions of that path.
What is your expression?
Be well,
May All Beings Be Free From Suffering
Rev. Sodaiho Roshi
This morning is the 8th day of the twelfth lunar cycle of the year: rohatsu. On this morning the Buddha looked up at the morning star and had a profound realization. He clearly saw that all things in all times are one, of one substance, interdependent and infinite, eternal, and always changing. But then he stood up and took a long walk.
He didn't go anywhere. There is no where to go. He was simply present, fully present with whoever he was with and in each moment, there was no difference between he and they. He saw clearly.
We know from his example and from the multitude of buddhas, before and after, that this kind of present moment living is possible even today. With practice and right understanding each of us are buddhas. Some of us are buddhas-in-waiting, but all of us are already buddhas.
As we take our next step into the new year please avoid making big plans. Have a place and live within it as fully as you possibly can: seeing clearly, tasting clearly, smelling clearly, feeling clearly, perceiving and thinking clearly everything just as it is with nothing added. This is our way.
On my calendar this morning it says:
Bring me a pearl from the bottom of the sea without getting wet.
What does this mean? If you read the words and get stuck in them you do not understand. What pearl? What sea? What does it mean "to bring"? What is "getting wet?"
When we understand this is not about thinking, not about words, but rather about correct action, then we are on the path. Our lives become actual expressions of that path.
What is your expression?
Be well,
May All Beings Be Free From Suffering
Rev. Sodaiho Roshi
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
Practice
Practice is just something we do every day. It is really nothing special, but then, nothing is. Ours is to just be as simply as we can be.
We may not sit down on a cushion and practice zazen, but as long as we live in each moment with our eyes open and our hearts in the right place, we are practicing Zen.
I try to encourage my students to sit daily, twice daily actuakky, but I am not always successful. I may not be a very good Teacher.
Still, I sit each night and most every morning. I sit alone usually in my small mountain zendo. It is often cold as the fire in the potbellied stove has usually gone out. I light incense and a candle. The flame and smoke blanket the brass statue of the Buddha that sits before me. My cushion supports my practice. The light washes my heart. It is quiet and my mind settles finally.
Tomorrow will take care of itself.
A deep bow to you.
We may not sit down on a cushion and practice zazen, but as long as we live in each moment with our eyes open and our hearts in the right place, we are practicing Zen.
I try to encourage my students to sit daily, twice daily actuakky, but I am not always successful. I may not be a very good Teacher.
Still, I sit each night and most every morning. I sit alone usually in my small mountain zendo. It is often cold as the fire in the potbellied stove has usually gone out. I light incense and a candle. The flame and smoke blanket the brass statue of the Buddha that sits before me. My cushion supports my practice. The light washes my heart. It is quiet and my mind settles finally.
Tomorrow will take care of itself.
A deep bow to you.
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