The root of human suffering (Dukkha) is found in our countless desires and our need to change life's circumstances to satisfy those desires. Many of those desires are extreme, unending, the source of disappointment and anger when frustrated, as well as the trigger for other harmful emotions such as jealousy, anxiety and the like. Thus, we might think that we must achieve all those goals and desires to be happy, remove one by one the endless targets of our anger, sadness, fear and other such emotions in order then to feel satisfied. We think we need to work to fix these things to fix them.
However, the surprising twist of Shikantaza is that one sits feeling radically satisfied just by the act of sitting, putting down all measures of some "lack" in sitting, desiring nothing but sitting when sitting, whereby the root for disappointment, anger, comparisons, despair, fear, frustration and our other desires drops away, and thus Dukkha drops away. The goal of sitting is sitting, which is satisfied by sitting. As counter-intuitive as it sounds, there is simply nothing more to desire, nothing else to change or fix, during the time of sitting ... and that fact changes and fixes a lot about what ails us, because the anger, fear and all the rest lose their fuel. The anger and fear evaporate by radical acceptance of what is (including sometimes even our feeling anger or fear), by our not demanding or wishing anything else but sitting while sitting, which acceptance thus changes how we are and how we experience life, thus nullifying the anger and fear. Counter-intuitive.
Another counter-intuitive fact about Shikantaza is that we do not care about (neither while sitting, nor at other times) what is called "Kensho," an experience of the hard borders of self and the world dropping away, and all phenomena flowing in and becoming each other and all. Nor do we hope for pleasant "Samadhi" concentrative states while sitting. We do not seek for anything in the whole wide world while sitting other than sitting, which sitting we take (as a matter of profound trust) to be itself the action and embodiment of Buddhas and Ancestors sitting just by our sitting. We sit needing nothing, neither Kensho nor no Kensho, neither Samadhi nor no Samadhi, for all we need for completion is to sit ... and we are sitting.
However, the funny thing that may happen is that, by the very action of sitting just to sit, with its accompanying equanimity and leaving aside other desires, whether following the breath or sitting in 'open awareness,' the hard borders between self and the rest of the world may soften, sometimes fully drop away, and all phenomena are tasted to flow in and out, and become each other and all reality. For some folks, it is a sudden and profound experience of such which may last a short or long time. For other folks, it is more a subtle wisdom that gets into the bones over time. He who walks through the mist slowly, and she who dives into the ocean deeply, both become just as wet ... in fact, both prove to be the very ocean flowing all along. A sudden and steep Kensho or a slow and subtle Kensho is all still Kensho, still the very same wisdom.
Likewise, Shikantaza is always perfect, Samadhi or not. But another funny thing is that our sitting with trust in sitting's perfection, nothing else sought, simply following the breath or openly aware, can bring about rich experiences of Samadhi. It is like a present that one receives when one stops wanting it, stops trying to get it, stops making any effort for it at all (like those Chinese finger cuffs that release us only when we stop stuggling)! Samadhi happens, and that is good!
Thus another counter-intuitive wisdom of Shikantaza is that Zazen is good, just as good, still perfect even when Samadhi --does not-- happen. Each day, each moment of sitting, is just what it is. Zazen, and all this life and world, are never lacking, an attitude which causes the frustration, the anger, the fear and regret, to all fall away. Thus, as wisely-weird as it may sound, this very sitting not to change, not to attain anything, attains something most profound that truly changes us and all our encounter with the world. It is a most profound dropping of the demands, frictions and separations of body and mind, sometimes deep, sometimes light, sometimes not at all (yet, even then, as a matter of faith, we know that the moon is always shining even at those times when hidden behind the clouds).
Then, rising from the cushion, returning to this world of problems to solve, things to fear, places to go, many things to change or lacking, we set to work ... but now, with the knowing deep in our bones of nothing to change, nothing to fear, nothing lacking, no where else to go.
The paths which emphasize Kensho, or reaching deep Samadhi states are marvelous, wonderful paths! Even when I stick up for the uniqueness of Shikantaza, Just Sitting that Hits the Mark, I --never-- mean to put down such paths, and they are good paths for those who choose to walk them. But, I say to those folks too, please try to understand, and do not discount, the marvelous, wondrous path to right here, choiceless and this, which is Shikantaza.
Gassho, J
STLah
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