Just Do It

Good Morning Everyone,

 

Its a nice chilly morning and I am preparing now for my morning run.  I just did my weight work in my bathroom dumbbell gym: bicep curls, tricep kickbacks, delt raises, and shrugs.  I am doing one set of twenty reps in the morning, afternoon, and evening with the heaviest weight I can manage for that number of reps. I was going to go for a walk with my friend Abe, but he could not muster himself and my training partner, Katie, isn't feeling very well.  So, I am on my own.

 

Life is like that.

 

We partner with people, draw on their support, but in the end it is our own effort and willingness to get down and do the thing that really counts. 

 

Yesterday I sat alone at the Veteran's Park.  The air was not particularly cold, but I wore a thermal insulated shirt under my robe. It was a peaceful two periods of Zazen.

 

From there I went to Temple Beth El where I led two periods of meditation.  This was a good little group.  We even had one of my Zen students attend, Sara Moren.  It was a delight to see her!  She has spent the last few weeks at San Francisco Zen Center and has just applied for a eight week program there. 

 

After meditation we sat with cups of tea in the social hall and talked a bit.  Community is an important ingredient in our practice.

 

I look forward to sitting at the Federal Building in Las Cruces on Wednesday at 4:00 PM.  If you are up to it, come join me!

 

Be well. 

 

Rev. Dr. So Daiho Hilbert-roshi 

Clear Mind Zen

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On Pots and Hummingbirds

Good Morning Everyone,

 

Yesterday at the El Paso Sangha, I offered at teiso on everyday life.  I used a portion of Master Dogen's Tenzo Kyokun (Instructions for the Cook), translated by Uchiyama-roshi of the Soto tradition,.and a portion of the book, Novice to Master by Morinaga-roshi of the Rinzai tradition.  One of the fundamental tenets of our practice -- Soto or Rinzai-- is this:  there is no trash. The second fundamental derives as,: everything is sacred, but nothing is special.  This means we should honor the everyday, finding in the everyday everything we need.

 

Yet, we human beings go around marking things as special.  We invest things with meaning.

 

This is why we suffer so: Everything, special or ordinary,  dissolves over time and returns to the Source.

 

So, on the one hand, we should recognize the sacred is the everyday, and on the other hand, we should not endeavour to hold onto it.  We should practice with the knowledge that everything is transitory.  Everything.

 

How do we do this practice?  By opening ourself up. Or, as Uchiyama-roshi suggests, opening the hand of thought.

 

Its rather like scrubbing out a pot caked with pudding residue.  We just scrub, noticing the transformational nature of the process.  Or like holding out our finger at a hummingbird feeder, generating warm and loving thoughts, and remaining very still. A hummingbird will perch on the finger offered.  We can only witness this; feel the tiny, lovely body on our finger, but we cannot grasp it.

 

So, as we add "lovely" and "warm" to our experience of the hummingbird, it is fleeting and no more special than cleaning a pot. Both are in the moment experiences both are transitory, both are special, and both are everyday..

 

Be well.

 

. 

 

Rev. Dr. So Daiho Hilbert-roshi 

http://www.clearmindzen.org 

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Extraordinary Magic

Good Morning Everyone,

My Little Honey has just completed a short novel entitled "The Extraordinary Magic of Everyday Life" In it she has three aged women, one of whom is a bag lady, and with the magic of a teddy bear and everyday life, itself, they come of age. This process of coming of age is interesting. It is in the process of rising to the occasions required by activities of the ordinary with friends and family that we take our place in the world.

Yesterday we went to see "The Bucket List" and while the activities on that list were wonderful "things to do" the really important stuff was relational. We often forget that. At least I do. Yet, as I am aging, like my wife's characters in her book, I trust I am coming of age myself.

We cannot short circuit the process and there are no real short cuts. Life is to be lived and the less we live in the creation of our minds, the more we live in the everyday moments, the more authentic our lives. Zen is all about that.

This morning I will drive down to El Paso to visit my friends at the El Paso Sitting Group. Then I teach a class at the Jewish Academy. Life is good.

Be well.



Rev. Dr. So Daiho Hilbert-roshi
http://www.clearmindzen.org/

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Cooking Your Life

Good Morning Everyone,

 

This morning is again a cold one.  The temps are in the low twenties and I am scheduled to go sit in front of the environmental center.  Sitting Zazen in the cold is no fun.  I've noticed that my nose runs, eyes water, and internal things begin to shake. This can't be good. 

 

I am cancelling my morning outdoor sits until the morning temps are above 35.

 

I missed the Wednesday Peace Vigil due to Rev. Kokyo's surgery.  It was supposed to be in the early morning, but it was moved to the afternoon.  So it goes.  Life is full of little twists and turns and the more quickly we get to a point where we relax into them the better. Just like on a motorcycle, you don't resist leaning into the curve.

 

Learning to let go is really important.  Last night we attended Chef Jacob's opening night at Meson de Mesilla.  It was an unexpectedly large crowd, every table full, the lounge crowded, and a very green kitchen staff.  I stepped back to the kitchen a few times.  The wait staff were really stressed. The cooks were very stressed. I invited them to breath free and easy.  We smiled together.  And while this didn't speed things up, it may have helped them settle their internal engines just a little. 

 

As with anything intense, it is very important to learn to relax within the intensity.  While running, for example, a runner can place their attention on their calf muscles and relax them with each step.  The same for our arms, chests, and shoulders.  The key is learning to notice the muscle groups and understand that we have real control over them when we decide we can take it.

 

An easy breath with a smile and pleasant thought in the middle of yuk is always a welcome, if brief, relief.

 

The evening at Meson was extraordinarily delicious.  The music was wonderful.  The atmosphere elegant.  If any of you ever get to Las Cruces, please visit.

 

Be well.

 

 

 

 

Rev. Dr. So Daiho Hilbert-roshi 

http://www.clearmindzen.org 

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The Small Things

Good Morning Everyone,

 

Life is good.  This morning's power outage made an impression on me.  When we are at our Refuge in the mountains we have no power outages, period (due to our own, reliable, solar power system, and there is always heat through the woodburning cookstove or propane furnace.  As we rose early this morning and wanted coffee, though, the percolator refused to work without electric. Imagine that.  In the mountains, we would simply get the cookstove going and shortly we would have our coffee and tea.

 

Lessons: Always have matches available, candles, and flashlights with batteries. Have a small propane campstove available to heat water for coffee and tea. And always have a battery operated radio available to find out what's going on.

 

My matches were not in my drawer.  My flashlight was emptied of batteries in an attempt a few weeks ago to get a tape recorder to work, and we left our propane campstove in the mountains.

 

Fortunately, my memory is sometimes in good repair, especially in the morning so I was able to find, in the dark, a book of matches, a small flashlight and my Itty-Bitty Booklight (which actually had batteries in it!).

 

So, live in the moment, live by your wits, and be grateful for the small things in life.

 

Be well. 

 

 

Rev. Dr. So Daiho Hilbert-roshi 

http://www.clearmindzen.org 

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Taking a short break

Hello All,

 

Just a quick note to let you know I'm taking a short break from writing.  My Little Honey had surgery on her nose yesterday to remove a malignant basal cell carcinoma, my son in Florida is having a rather sticky heart procedure Friday, and I am just plan tired.

 

Please keep Judy and Jason in your prayers.  Also, my former Disciple Rev. Sam Kokyo is having a hip replaced tomorrow and we will attend his partner Mary Ellen in the surgery waiting room.  Keep him in your thoughts as well.

 

Lastly, thank you Deana Kessin, for keeping me company while Judy was being treated in the hospital outpatient surgery center.

 

Meditation at the synagogue went well and I have double the number of students I expected to have in my spirituality class at the Academy of Jewish Learning. I guess there is a demand for a JuBu Zen priest :)

 

Anyway,

 

Be well.

 

 

 

Rev. Dr. So Daiho Hilbert-roshi 

http://www.clearmindzen.org 

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Work Meditation

Good Morning Everyone,

 

In the West we often think of the sacred as something special residing in a special place or created through a special activity. In fact, we often think of the universe as divided and separated, categorized, tagged and bagged: me ~ not me.

 

In Zen, East or West, we strive to see through this delusion, this veil of ignorance, and see that everything is one.  In such a world, there is no sacred, no profane, nothing special, there is just the world we experience as we experience it.  We could say this is mundane.  Hardly.  It is, in fact, extraordinary.

 

The universe is all us, everything.  Our breath and our very existence both depends on it and it depends on us.  Nothing means anything without our making it mean something.  We are partners with the Infinite.

 

In Zen, we approach all activity in this way: meditation, walking, eating.  Today I will suggest that even our work is such an activity.  We call work meditation, samu. It is typically done as a meditative practice in monasteries, but also at Zen Centers during retreats.  The reason I indicated both is that during retreats at Zen Centers, samu is taught as a contemplative practice, whereas in a monastic context, all work activity is samu, all work activity then is contemplative. 

 

In our "secular" lives, I suggest we live as if we are monastics, in the sense that we make all life activity a source of contemplation.

 

When we approach work as a spiritual activity what do we mean?  First, I think, we approach it openly. Work is not opposed to us.  It is not an exchange value, it is in itself.

 

Second, we appreciate all of the activity.  We reside in the activity as if there were no other activity to be done in that moment because, in truth, there is nothing other than what we are doing just now.  Multitasking is at best a fiction, at worst, a house dividing itself.

 

As we approach our work with an open heart and willingness to be completely present during it something really wonderful happens.  It becomes our own regardless of who we are doing it for or what we might receive in return.  This is the value of living in the moment.  There are no degrees of separation.

 

Be well.

 

 

 

 

 

Rev. Dr. So Daiho Hilbert-roshi 

http://www.clearmindzen.org 

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