Strategies for off the cushion mindfulness

[Douglas]

I believe I'm already doing much, but I thought I'd ask about the strategies and methods others here use to stay mindful during the day.

In addition to a "mindfulness" bell on my phone that gently prods me randomly throughout the day, when I catch myself with a grasping or wandering mind, in addition to stopping and watching my breath, I also "feel" my extremities. In addition, I attempt to inhabit that space in-between thoughts (hard to describe. Is that the same as "Thinking not thinking"?).

What do you do?
Gassho,
SAT/LAH
Doug

[Bion]

I find myself naturally returning to my body and breath in my daily activities. The same as in zazen, the body-mind does this great self-regulatory thing, where it'll offer correction. The challenge is to take that correction, to notice it and go along with it. I don't think I do anything too special throughout the day. I do my best to start off the day with zazen, and for that, I mindfully go through all the forms. I try to put in place good conditions for myself to be present with everything around me, and it time that became me not needing music on when cooking or doing some things, me recognizing organically when my phone takes over and I incessantly scroll through videos, me noticing when I walk mindlessly down the street, or when my posture shifts etc. It is really not a forced thing. A bit like in zazen, I simply return to body-mind. That doesn't mean I don't multitask, or don't rush, or that I don't daydream. It's just that I catch myself doing it or I kind of naturally do it less. The more I create good conditions and nurture good qualities, the more present I seem to be. Something like that... No fancy tips here, I'm afraid.

Gassho
sat lah

[Tairin]

A few years ago we read “ The Art of Simple Living: 100 Daily Practices from a Zen Buddhist Monk for a Lifetime of Calm and Joy” by Shunmyo Masuno. I have adopted a few of those into my daily practice. Little things like making sure my shoes are aligned when I take them off or bowing to the toilet (yes really) and sink. Things I do several times a day. It helps give me periodic anchors and reminders.


Tairin
sat today and lah

[Douglas]

A few years ago we read “ The Art of Simple Living: 100 Daily Practices from a Zen Buddhist Monk for a Lifetime of Calm and Joy” by Shunmyo Masuno. I have adopted a few of those into my daily practice. Little things like making sure my shoes are aligned when I take them off or bowing to the toilet (yes really) and sink. Things I do several times a day. It helps give me periodic anchors and reminders.


Tairin
sat today and lah

Thats a great suggestion! I might burst into laughter after bowing at my toilet though. Just be sure to FLUSH before you bow

gassho
SAT/LAH
-Doug

[Bion]

Thats a great suggestion! I might burst into laughter after bowing at my toilet though. Just be sure to FLUSH before you bow

gassho
SAT/LAH
-Doug

That's the whole point. The poop is no more defiled or sacred than anything else.

gassho
sat lah

[Douglas]

That's the whole point. The poop is no more defiled or sacred than anything else.

gassho
sat lah

Oh, I was being practical. Close lid and don't bow face down toward the bowl before flushing! (I'm a humor mood today!) lol

gassho
sat lah

[Bion]

Oh, I was being practical. Close lid and don't bow face down toward the bowl before flushing! (I'm a humor mood today!) lol

gassho
sat lah

gassho
sat lah

[Myo-jin]

I practiced aikido for about 12 years and one of the things that was central to it was bringing the mind back to the ‘one point’ (臍下の一点) in the lower abdomen, roughly analogous to the ‘Hara’, spoken of in other Japanese systems .

This is essentially a grounding and centering exercise that relaxes the body and brings the mind quickly to a natural and focussed state. After so long it’s basically automatic, but it took time to internal and make automatic.

Easy in principle, not so easy to actually make habitual, but once learned an invaluable tool.

Gassho

Sattlah

Myojin

[Jundo]

We still have available in the dusty library the readings from Rev. Shunmyo Masuno's "100 Daily Practices from a Zen Buddhist Monk."

LINK

For our Ango period a couple of years ago, we took some of those and suggested that folks might wish to adopt a few in their daily life. Below are some that have to do with being more mindful.

But remember: I think folks sometimes confuse Zen practice as intending us to be mindful about everything, all the time. Or, they think that we are also to do one thing, at one time, focused on that one thing. That is a mistake! Those are skills to develop and to turn to sometimes, when appropriate. It is good to do so a few times during one's day (e.g., when washing the dishes, gardening, playing with the kids). However there is no need ... and it would be quite hard to function ... to do so always. In fact, it is more important, I say, to "let each moment be that moment, as it is," rather than to always "be in the moment." For example, if "the moment" involves your up to your neck in life ... that is what is happening in that moment.



Gassho, J
stlah

~~~~

The following is a list of short exercises based on the wonderful book by Soto Zen Priest Shunmyo Masuno, "The Art of Simple Living." (LINK) Most take but a few minutes. ... but you may wish to choose one or two of these exercises each week or so (we leave which ones to you) and try them, ....

Here is a list if you want to try, no need to take them in order or do them all, or even most, and undertake just what resonates:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

- Part With Something: Give something away that you are rather attached to, and give it to someone who can benefit from it. No, please do not make it your spouse or dog, nor do you need to give away your house quite yet! Just something small but important to you which you would resist parting with. Experience how it makes you feel to do so, and whether you can let that feeling go.

- A Coffee/Tea Ceremony: If you use an automatic coffee maker or usually rush the making coffee, please do so in very slow motion, maybe 1/3 speed, rinsing the pot, opening the cover, picking up and placing it carefully down, adding the water while truly looking and listening to the sound, unfolding and placing the filter while feeling the contours, spooning and deeply inhaling the scent of the coffee grounds, pushing the button followed by Gassho, watching and listening to the percolation sound and steam during the entire brewing, pouring into the cup and taking the first taste (or do the equivalent if a tea drinker). It can be a small "coffee ceremony" with a touch of the spirit of the Tea Ceremony, a Japanese ritual much appreciated in Zen circles.

- Just Eating: Have one meal this week in which you put the phone or reading material down, just eat in silence, experiencing the food. If you think about something, leave the politics and personal problems completely aside, and just think about the food ... where it came from, the ground and sun and rain, the farmers and truck drivers, the life it brings etc ... When eating at least one meal this week, pause after each bite and savor a sense of gratitude in your heart. Receit the Meal Gatha before hand with extra slowness and care.

- Don't Worry About Something You Cannot Control: When something happens this week or comes to mind that you really cannot control, drop from mind all worry and thoughts of control.

- Become Adept At Switching Modes: Enter your office, kitchen, bathroom, toilet or the like (choose just two or three this week) as if there were an actual spiritual gate to enter sacred ground, a ritual about to commence. Does it cause you to experience the specialness of the place and event through new eyes? Thereupon, proceed to treat it so.

- Join Your Hands Together: Gassho (Bow with Pressed Palms) quite a few times this week, to things and moments to which you might not normally Gassho ... to a passing car, a passing stranger on the street, a weed in the sidewalk, the coffee maker, the toilet brush, an ant, a rusty tin can on the sidewalk, just to the air we breathe. No need to plan your bowing, let it just come spur of the moment, but offer a sincere bow of gratitude and connection.

- Make Time To Be Alone: Find some nature in which to just sit for some minutes, being secluded, putting the world down with all its concerns. Don't sit Zazen, but just appreciate the quiet of nature around you. If in a crowded and noisy city, any bench in a park will do, or if not that, even sitting next to a potted houseplant, or a single fallen leaf or weed in the sidewalk will do, and just let the quiet and seclusion happen in your heart. The mountains and rivers are inside you, not only outside.

- Get In Touch With Nature: Make a little miniature garden in a shoe box with just some dirt, pebbles, twigs and fallen leaves. Or take a minute or two to just make one in one's mind. Or just encounter a single stone, or leaf or flower this week, really stop to hold it, smell it, rub it, look at it and see it for a moment. Nothing to think about it, nothing to change, a jewel as it is.

- See the Falling Sun: Take a moment to watch a sunset, whether from the country or between buildings in a city, whether on a clear or a cloudy or rainy day. Just take a moment to remind yourself that, clear or cloudy, whether like a postcard or hidden by walls and electric lines, ideal or seemingly no big deal at all ... it is this unique sunset, just as it is, nothing to add or take away. Be grateful to be witnessing it, whatever kind of sunset. Our life shines from that sun. Ideally just what it is, perfect or imperfect, thus it is always a Big Deal!

- Die Content: For a moment, imagine yourself on your own death bed, but feeling content and happy about being there. Truly pretend for a moment. Can you also witness the moment like you witnessed that sunset in the previous item, with the same acceptance and wonder? It is our sunset.

- Do What You Can Now: Do a job intentionally dropping from mind that conditions are less than optimal, or not how you want at all. Do the job diligently and attentively, but drop from mind complaints about how the situation should be better. How does that change your experience of doing the job?

- Discover Another You: Change you inner labeling about yourself, and actually play act the feelings of being some other you, like an actor in a play. For example, if naturally shy, pretend for some minutes that one is an outgoing and charismatic personality, and interact with strangers and others believing and feeling so. If sad or depressed, pretend happiness and contentment.

- Don't Be Troubled By Things That Have Not Yet Happened: When troubled this week by some possible event or outcome that may happen in your future, let it be, drop the future from mind, and focus only on what is happening right now.

- Do The Tedious: Do a task that you find tedious, and see it as an art to master no matter how small or ordinary (even making breakfast, making copies or washing the clothes). Do it with a felt dedication and sincerity in heart, enjoying it just to do, without complaints in mind such as "this is tedious" or "I wish I were doing something else." You will be a master of the art of just doing this. Undertake the task with "clear mind," not letting it settle on other things or wander. Nonetheless, keep you mind relaxed, free and open.

- Enter The Door: Try thinking of doorways you pass through as special gates, and within those gates only one activity is done. For example, walking through the kitchen door, only cooking ... no family or business. Walking through the office door, only work ... no cooking or family. Walking through the living room door, only family ... no business or cooking. Try that with at least a couple of doors this week.

- Pick And Go: If facing a choice among many attractive options this week, just pick one ... a simple one ... and just be satisfied.

- Do Not Fear Change: Look in the mirror, and spot some change to your face or body associated with age. Welcome it and feel fine about it.

- Groove On A Leaf: Find a random leaf, and spend several minutes doing nothing else but closely examining its surface, feeling its texture, seeing if it has a smell and (if truly brave) trying its taste. Do not analyze intellectually your conclusion, but just experience the sensations.

- Don't Let Things Go To Waste: Take a part of some food you ordinarily throw away and find a recipe or reuse them in some other way. For example, these simple recipes for cooking onion skins that we often throw in the trash (https://food52.com/blog/16853-4-ways...up-onion-skins) or for lemon peels (https://food-hacks.wonderhowto.com/h...peels-0168627/). In Zen life, precious resources are used with much greater care and efficiency than most of us bother with in modern consumer life. Rescue some item or object about to be tossed in the trash, and repurpose it in some useful way. For example, wash out a used tin soup can and turn it into a holder for old nails, an incense burner or maybe a planter for a seed to grow. Use old worn clothes to clean some part of your house you have forgotten to clean for awhile or, if good with a needle (like all our Rakusu sewers now are) to sew into some new item (https://www.buzzfeed.com/connieesch/...hes-throw-away).

- Appreciate Your Connection With Things: Find an object or tool you use daily around the house, very mundane and ordinary, which you give little thought or notice. Take a moment to consider it, feel appreciation for what it does for you, and offer a Gassho.

- Giving Thanks: This week, please thank, for no obvious reason, a few people who did not obviously do anything for you. If they ask why, just say, "No reason, just thank you." Say thank you upon waking, just for waking in the morning.

- A Real Encounter: Have an encounter with someone, whether long or short, in which one pays full attention, as if there is no before or after, and this one conversation is a special and sacred highlight of life.

- Extra Care: If helping a colleague, customer or child learn or do something such as by answering a question, teaching a skill, or helping with homework, please slow down a bit and offer a little extra care.

- Accept And Be: Think of some relationship where you and the other person really disagree, perhaps about politics or religion. Accept the fact, bow, and move forward (not the same as above, because hopefully here the relationship can continue nonetheless).

- Accept Some More: View some difficult or unpleasant person or event in the news (not hard these days) from the still point at the core of ups and downs, like and dislike, with deep equanimity. How does it feel?

- Let It Be: lf someone says something critical, unpleasant or unfair about you this week (almost a daily happening for me! ) just do not be attached and let it be.

- No Motives: Have an encounter with someone this week in which you truly drop all thought and measure of getting something or not getting something from the person and the encounter.

- Filled With Satisfaction: Deny yourself this week some thing or acquisition you really want. However, rather than just "toughing it out" and gritting your teeth, fill your heart with feeling of satisfaction, fulfillment and joy about some thing or things you already enjoy in life. What happens?

- Doing Without Goal: Take some goal oriented work or process you are involved in this week ... washing dishes, learning a new skill, pulling weeds in the garden etc. ... and turn it into a "just this moment, just this moment" experience, with equanimity beyond good and bad about each moment. How does it change the experience? Do you still get the task done?

- Accept Even More: Thoroughly accept some situation you cannot change and which bothers you. Start with something small in your life, then maybe even try something bigger. It should be something which you really cannot change for purposes of this exercise.

- A New Lease: Spend a moment to picture yourself having some "final thoughts" on your death bed, but make sure that they are appreciative thoughts, appreciating all that happened in your life, the many twists and turns, forgiving yourself by recognizing that any of us make mistakes but that you tried to do your best or to make amends when you did not. (And, by the way, if you have not made amends or made up for mistakes in life, it is still not too late!) Then, after doing so for a few moments, imagine that you were handed a new lease on life for at least another day ...

[Jundo]

Let me also post here my usual caution about misunderstanding the need to be always "mindful" ...

~~~~

It seems to me that many people in Zen Practice have come to confuse "being present/mindful in the moment" (for example, "when drinking tea, just drink tea" ... a sometimes appropriate and lovely way to experience life) ... with "being present with the moment" (allowing and merging with conditions of life "just as they are"). The two are not quite the same, and are often confused, and the latter is much more at the heart of this Shikantaza Path ...

Yes, I believe that there are times to be "mindful" ... and there are times not. Sometimes when I eat, I just eat ... when I sip tea, I just sip tea ... when bowing, just bowing ... fully absorbed in that action. A wonderful, insightful practice. When doing one thing, just do one thing with all one's body-and-mind.

At other times, I just grab a sandwich and a coke while reading the newspaper and thinking about the job I have to do. That's life too. Nothing wrong with it. That's what's happening in that moment too.

(I do not know where the extreme idea started among some folks that the 'goal' of this practice is to live the first way every moment of every day. That would be pretty awful (if not harmful) to live like that all or even most of the time. What's wrong with also sometimes reading the paper, thinking about work, while grabbing a quick sandwich? There is a place for all of that.)

People also confuse such "mindfulness" with the actual, more traditional meaning of "mindfulness" in Buddhism: Namely, to develop awareness of the "mind theatre" running constantly in our heads (developing the ability to identify the thoughts and emotions that play through our heads, and how they create our experience of "reality" ... e.g., "now I am temporarily sad" "now I am reacting with anger") That is a most important, powerful practice too ... very very important (But even there, I caution against thinking that you must or can do that 24/7.)

In my view, the heart of this Practice is merely "being at one" with this self-life-world just as it is ... dropping the resistance, barriers, separation between our "self" and all the circumstances in which that "self" imagines it finds itself in ... until even the walls between "self" and "life-world" (or self and itself) soften or even fully drop away ...

So, for example, when drinking tea, just do that and fully allow that. When grabbing a sandwich while reading the paper and thinking about your annoying co-worker in the office, just do that and fully allow that (and fully allow the craziness in the newspaper and your annoying co-worker too). When your kid plops in your lap during tea drinking and the cup spills all over the table, just do and allow that. When temporarily falling into sadness or anger, just do and allow that (although remember that "mind theatre" and see if you truly need to be that way, and seek to be not that way if you can). When overwrought with life for a moment, just do that and fully allow that (remembering in the back of your mind that the clear, boundless blue sky is behind the clouds of thought and emotion even when momentarily covered over). When suffering with old age and sickness of ourself or someone we love, even death, just do that and fully allow that.

In my view, all of the above together is truly balanced, "mindful" living. That is "being the moment".

Gassho, J
stlah

[Myo-jin]

It seems to me that many people in Zen Practice have come to confuse "being present/mindful in the moment" (for example, "when drinking tea, just drink tea" ... a sometimes appropriate and lovely way to experience life) ... with "being present with the moment" (allowing and merging with conditions of life "just as they are"). The two are not quite the same, and are often confused, and the latter is much more at the heart of this Shikantaza Path ...

Can you give a more concrete example of how these two differ?

To take the tea drinking example, if the conditions of life are at this moment 'just drinking tea', is not that 'just drinking tea' not 'merging with the conditions of life'?

Or to put it aother way, when is 'just drinking tea' other than being present in the moment (that just happens to involve drinking tea)?

If I had to say something, my instinct is that the difference is in the intentionality of 'now I'm going to 'just drink tea', rather than just letting tea drinking happen without making a thing out of it.

Gassho

Sattlah

Myojin

[Shui_Di]

Hi Douglas,

Let me share my opinion based on my little experience.

I agree with Jundo, that there is difference between being mindful and being present of the moment.

Maybe I will use my language to explain it.

Trying to be mindful is not the same with really be mindful.
And trying to be present is not the same with being in the present.

Once we TRY, in that moment we already not in the moment. Because TRYing means that the mind is not satisfied with the condition at THE MOMENT, so we try to get something else better. While the true "be with the present" means we are just be here with the reality without ADDING anything else. (Even if you realise that your habit of adding some value on thing, just be and accept that too)

So trying to be in the present means we lost already the present. But trying to not to try is also already trying, which means you also lost the present.

That's why the Diamond Sutra says, "The past can't be grasp, the Present can't be grasped, the Future can't be grasp".

Because no matter how you TRY to grasp it, you won't get it. Why? Because you TRY. (Or, trying to not trying). We will always lose the present.

But do we really lose the PRESENT? or maybe we NEVER lose it.

So what should we do? Trying is wrong, not trying also wrong?

But what if, Trying is also right, and not trying is also right?

Somehow I remember about the book I read "the Story of Lotus Sutra", where it is said, no matter where we look everywhere is just the skillful means of the Buddha.

So maybe we should drop the mind of trying or not trying. Mindful or not mindful, Be present or not be present. Because we ALREADY be in the present.

But yes, of course to really understand it in our daily life, there is method that we do. And there is a "little trying" too. In Zazen, we still trying to sit upright. In bowing we still trying to bow "correctly". Like Jundo said, there is a time we also trying to be mindful such as in the oryoki practice. When we drive, of course we should be mindful with another cars. So trying to be mindful is okay too, but don't be too much.

Just like you hold a candle. You can try to move your candle to lighten your room. But sometimes just let the candle be settled in your desk, is already illuminating the whole room by itself. More you move it here and there, the candle's fire we be smaller and even dies.

The way of Zen is trying without trying. Or maybe to understand that trying and not trying is just the same things. Something that we "should" drop, even nothing need to be dropped.

Gassho, Mujo
Stlah

[Jundo]

Can you give a more concrete example of how these two differ?

To take the tea drinking example, if the conditions of life are at this moment 'just drinking tea', is not that 'just drinking tea' not 'merging with the conditions of life'?

Or to put it aother way, when is 'just drinking tea' other than being present in the moment (that just happens to involve drinking tea)?

If I had to say something, my instinct is that the difference is in the intentionality of 'now I'm going to 'just drink tea', rather than just letting tea drinking happen without making a thing out of it.

Gassho

Sattlah

Myojin

Hi Myojin,

Sorry for the delay. Due to a lack of mindfulness, I forgot to respond to you yesterday.

I just make a distinction between "just drinking tea," everything else forgotten, total focus on the tea ...

And, sometimes accepting the fact that one needs to drink tea while the doorbell buzzes, the phone rings, the baby is crying, the bills are unpaid and the kitchen stove is on fire ... dealing with all of that as best one can ... while also accepting somehow, deep down in one's heart, this buzzing, ringing, crying, unpaid, burning moment of tea ... just that buzzing, ringing, crying, etc., moment.

The former is being "mindful" of one thing in one moment, and the latter is the mindfulness of accepting the moment of chaos as that moment of chaos. Both are good skills to have.

Gassho, J
stlah

[Myo-jin]

And, sometimes accepting the fact that one needs to drink tea while the doorbell buzzes, the phone rings, the baby is crying, the bills are unpaid and the kitchen stove is on fire ...

I’m going to have to check for hidden cameras, it’s like you’ve seen exactly how I drink my tea…

Understood, and in practice that’s what happens anyway. I’ve yet to find the tea that blots out awareness of everything else, legally that is.

Gassho

satlah

Myojin

[Douglas]

Hi Douglas,

Let me share my opinion based on my little experience.

I agree with Jundo, that there is difference between being mindful and being present of the moment.

Maybe I will use my language to explain it.

Trying to be mindful is not the same with really be mindful.
And trying to be present is not the same with being in the present.

Once we TRY, in that moment we already not in the moment. Because TRYing means that the mind is not satisfied with the condition at THE MOMENT, so we try to get something else better. While the true "be with the present" means we are just be here with the reality without ADDING anything else. (Even if you realise that your habit of adding some value on thing, just be and accept that too)

So trying to be in the present means we lost already the present. But trying to not to try is also already trying, which means you also lost the present.

That's why the Diamond Sutra says, "The past can't be grasp, the Present can't be grasped, the Future can't be grasp".

Because no matter how you TRY to grasp it, you won't get it. Why? Because you TRY. (Or, trying to not trying). We will always lose the present.

But do we really lose the PRESENT? or maybe we NEVER lose it.

So what should we do? Trying is wrong, not trying also wrong?

But what if, Trying is also right, and not trying is also right?

Somehow I remember about the book I read "the Story of Lotus Sutra", where it is said, no matter where we look everywhere is just the skillful means of the Buddha.

So maybe we should drop the mind of trying or not trying. Mindful or not mindful, Be present or not be present. Because we ALREADY be in the present.

But yes, of course to really understand it in our daily life, there is method that we do. And there is a "little trying" too. In Zazen, we still trying to sit upright. In bowing we still trying to bow "correctly". Like Jundo said, there is a time we also trying to be mindful such as in the oryoki practice. When we drive, of course we should be mindful with another cars. So trying to be mindful is okay too, but don't be too much.

Just like you hold a candle. You can try to move your candle to lighten your room. But sometimes just let the candle be settled in your desk, is already illuminating the whole room by itself. More you move it here and there, the candle's fire we be smaller and even dies.

The way of Zen is trying without trying. Or maybe to understand that trying and not trying is just the same things. Something that we "should" drop, even nothing need to be dropped.

Gassho, Mujo
Stlah

Thank you for this. One of my little "challenges" has been dealing with this conundrum, the circular "you can't do anything, because doing anything—even trying not to grasp...is grasping."

Of late I've decided to adopt an attitude of not worrying about it. Just do what I need to do. Do my practice daily, be mindful when I remember to.
I can no more stop thinking or wanting than I could stop being a human with thoughts and wants! One of the challenges of Buddhism, it seems, is that we come to this path precisely BECAUSE we want something. Then you are told that wanting is the root of your problem, which then can be really discouraging, because how would you get rid of wanting? Why would you?

The middle way (as I understand it) is the way to approach it. Desire isn't bad, but don't grasp it so hard. That's what I've been "trying" to do of late (if it can be called "trying"...lol).

Shunryu Suzuki's quote "Each of you is perfect the way you are... and you can use a little improvement" has been popping into my mind frequently recently.

Now if I could only get my legs to be flexible enough for that new bench I bought for zazen

Gassho,
sat/lah