BOOK OF EQUANIMITY - Case 53

[Hoseki]

Gassho

Sattoday
Adam

[Jika]

Again, the comment was very helpful to me (or more confusing).

Thinking about who the potter is, owning the tools and the wheel.
I used to do pottery for a very short time.
Usually I can't accept teachers interfering with my work - of course they can do better, but this is my lump of clay, isn't it?
Pottery is hard to explain with words.
There, in fact, it can be helpful when someone leads your hands into the right movement.

Gassho
Jika
#sattoday

[Risho]

At a more conventional level, each member of this sangha is teaching all of the others, and Jundo might even get something out of our words now and again! His guidance and words keep us all on track.

Yes!

I really enjoy this koan; it's easy to fall to one side and say "to hell with teachers" or fall to the other and gassho and smile and say oh wow what so and so said is brilliant but, if some person that you don't know from Adam said the same thing, you'd not even pay attention. So: anarchy or hero worship.

Which is interesting because it puts the focus on who we consider authority. Ultimately we are our own authority. Jundo can only show us, but it's up to us to practice this.

I absolutely cringe when I encounter, and i don't mean to judge but this is how I feel, "group-thinkers" who are ready to just bow down to whomever they've deemed holy. It's sort of awkward when you see people that have been raised in the US, talking with this "affected" tone to their speech. And I'm like, "you realize you are living in the 21st century US"; it's just more costumes and BS.

But this is all holy. You are no more or less than anyone else!

If we simply say what our teacher says, then it's just regurgitation; we must go on and find our own Zen practice that means something for us; otherwise, we are just wasting time. At the same time, and to reiterate Kokuu's point, the importance of a Zen teacher and Sangha to me is that it keeps me rooted and from falling into my own ideas of practice. It's an absolute necessity for practice.

I think the point of this practice (I know there are many and none) is to really understand for ourselves what these teachings mean, and more than understand, practice.

I'm not a typical Zen practitioner; I'm not copping out of the precepts here, but I like drinking and I eat meat. I swear - sometimes I swear a lot. This practice isn't about becoming some serene, Vulcan robot. I don't pretend I'm something I'm not.. well I guess I do, but I don't. I don't think there is a typical zen practitioner because although we are the same in some sense, we are also individuals, so while we share in this practice, we absolutely must find our own.

So my teaching would be, don't copy what you think your idea of a Zen person is -- just be you! (even though you and I do not have nor will we ever fully know what we truly are - but it's definitely not our ideas of who we are).

Gassho,

Risho
-sattoday

Edit - I think a more important teaching would be to stay humble because to echo others here - everyone and everything we encounter is our teacher; plus, I've only been doing this for a short time, so it would be delusional to think I know that much anyway. hahahah