Last time in this series on "Why Zen Folks FAIL!", we looked at NOT KNOWING HOW NOT TO CHASE! Folks don't know how to be totally still. This time, the reason "Zen Folks FAIL!" is because of complacently NOT KNOWING HOW TO CHASE! Folks don't know how to keep climbing and moving! 
Saying about this life and world that "there is nothing in need of change" --does not-- mean "there is nothing in need of change". Simply because all things are "perfectly complete, just as they are", that --does not-- mean that all things are "perfectly complete, just as they are". Saying so is only from one beautiful perspective. In fact, to realize profoundly that "there is nothing in need of change", we must change our human tendencies of excess desire, anger, jealously and other divisive thoughts of ignorance. There is a lot about us in need of change in order to realize that nothing was ever in need of change from the first, not a drop.
Furthermore, although all things are "perfectly complete, just as they are", one can work to improve and achieve, with every step along the way being "perfectly complete, just as it are". Here is a simple example.
As a middle aged man with some weight to shed, I am constantly on a diet and doing my little exercises. In a Buddha's Eye, I am "perfectly complete, just as I am" while fat. A whole and complete fatty. However, from another perspective, I want to lose weight. So, while exercising, I am ""perfectly complete, just as I am" at every step while exercising and trying to loose weight. If I cheat on my diet with an extra piece of cake, that fact (and the cake too) is "perfectly complete, just as they are" although ... from another perspective ... cheating is failure and a ticket to fatness (so I try not to). If all goes well and I get skinny, I will be "perfectly complete, just as I am" while skinny. In other words, "perfectly complete, just as I am" all along the way. All is "perfectly complete without need of change" and "in need of great change cause far from perfect" AT ONCE!
Do ya get the picture?
Or, as Dogen (in his usual far from understated way) expresses our efforts right now ... our efforts right now are truly all the universe, all time and space, all being, making effort right now ...
The time-being right now is entirely actualized without being caught up in nets or cages. Deva kings and heavenly beings appearing right and left are the time-being of your complete effort right now. The time-being of all beings throughout the world in water and on land is just the actualization of your complete effort right now. All beings of all kinds in the visible and invisible realms are the time-being actualized by your complete effort, flowing due to your complete effort. Closely examine this flowing; without your complete effort right now, nothing would be actualized, nothing would flow. (Shobogenzo Uji)
And so it is throughout all our Buddhist Practice and life, as we work to be better, gentler, kinder, wiser and more compassionate human beings.
Comment