How do you stop trying to fix yourself during zazen ?

[Jundo]

FWIW from my perspective as a novice I personally find Jundo's instruction for "open, spacious awareness" helpful. So not so much concentrating on one thing, or specifically letting thoughts go, but rather just sitting with the doors of my awareness fully open in the act of sitting so thoughts dissolve on their own in a wider field of awareness.

Gassho,
Kevin
#ST #LAH

Yes, wonderful. Lovely.

Just to emphasize, though, that for folks who need, following the breath lightly is fine too. Some folks need that little extra anchor, for the mind can be like a boat in a stormy sea.

Gassho, J

STLah

[Jundo]

... Zazen, however, needs no improvement, which is a wonderful thing, really. Zazen can be sleepy, worried, easy, difficult, sore, anxious, long or short..but it always is zazen, so let it be what it is and just sit with all of it. ...

Yes, yes, beautiful.

Sleepy Zazen is just sleepy Zazen, worried Zazen is perfectly worried Zazen. Bad Zazen is excellent "Bad Zazen."

And yet, and yet, we do not want to wallow in worry, get tangled up in anxiety, nor sit there weighing and measuring whether our Zazen today is good or bad, easy or difficult. When sleepy, we just sit sleepy Zazen which is just sleepy Zazen ... and yet, we seek to get a good night's sleep too so that we are not so sleepy!

(A Koan)

Gassho, J

STLah

[Jundo]

By the way, I was not kidding that we should sit Zazen with the faith that Zazen is whole and complete qua Zazen, with sitting is the one thing to do (and even if one does not believe so, treat it like blind faith, religious faith, even if part of you is not convinced yet, simply because the very trusting helps make it come true! If you think Zazen complete, it is. If you think Zazen incomplete, it is ... because the only measuring of "complete vs. incomplete" is subjective, between your own ears.)

From Zen Master's Dance (my book ) ...

Zazen is all the Buddhas and Ancestors sitting in our own moment of sitting, as if our sitting turns us into those Buddhas and Ancestors on the spot. We must have faith in that fact. We must taste vibrantly that the mere act of sitting zazen is whole and complete, the total fruition of life’s goals, with nothing lacking and nothing added to the bare fact of sitting here and now. No matter how busy our lives or how strongly we may feel tempted to be elsewhere, for the time of sitting we put aside all other concerns. To do this, we must have a sense that the single act of crossing the legs as Dōgen instructed (or sitting in some other balanced posture, as many modern students do) is the realization of all we’ve ever sought. That is why there is simply no other place to go in the world, nothing else to do besides sit in this posture.

Even if we do not yet fully believe in the completeness of zazen, we can nonetheless have trust and faith in it, and that trust and faith will soon turn into an actual experience. A friend who is a Broadway performer and Zen practitioner once told me that the “non-method” of zazen is like the case of a method actor playing the part of Willie Loman in Death of a Salesman. First the actor merely pretends he is Willie but eventually comes to embody Willie from head to toe. So, if needed, we sit zazen in the role of a totally satisfied and equanimous Buddha until Buddha comes to life for us.

... Unfortunately, we modern teachers do not always sufficiently emphasize this sacred, complete fulfillment of just sitting. I have sometimes witnessed zazen explained to newcomers like this: “Just sit in an upright posture, let your thoughts go, just breathe.” I have heard the advice to students to “just follow the breath,” or “straighten the back,” or “don’t grab onto thoughts,” or “drop all goals,” all of which are right and good, but few teachers say something like: “Sit zazen with the conviction that sitting is all that is needed in life,” or, “Sit trusting that this sitting is the total fulfillment of all the universe,” or, “Sit with a subtle sense that, were you to die right now on the cushion, sitting alone would have made a complete life.” ...

However, we should not think about or voice this truth of the completeness of zazen during zazen, but we must silently and subtly feel it deep down. Our feelings of lack or dissatisfaction will drop away in the wholeness and equanimity of sitting. Thus, I sometimes describe zazen as a “non-self”-fulfilling prophecy because, when we feel that sitting is complete, it is complete. On the other hand, if we feel that our zazen is incomplete, then it is incomplete. Zazen is just zazen, life is just life, but our judgment is subjective. How we see zazen is entirely up to us. But if we can know it as complete, we can do the same with all of life.

(Sorry for running long, although I perfectly ran long)

Gassho, J

STLah

[Yokai]

Thank you Jundo (aka A Koan) and all

Gassho, Chris satlah

[Jakuden]

I just came across this in a new book, Discovering the True Self, a collection of excerpts from talks by Kodo Sawaki.

“Many people come to me and say, "When I do zazen distracting thoughts arise." You realize why you know distracting thoughts arise? It's because when you practice zazen you calm down and notice the distracting thoughts. Zazen is colorless and transparent. That's why those thoughts and ideas are so clearly evident."

Gassho,

Kirk

Sat

I like this... our minds are always doing something, but we don't notice until we sit quietly, then the racket of them can drive us crazy :-)

I like to view "coming back" as an active process, rather than a passive "letting go". It's the same thing, but feeling like I am actively redirecting my mind to spacious awareness--perhaps with the momentary realization of the breath, the pain in my knee, my daughter's music blaring in her room, or the knowledge of my little speck of a self within the Milky Way galaxy--is more the thing than trying to figure out how to "open the hand of thought" to let them fly away on their own.

Gassho
Jakuden
SatToday/LAH

[Ugrok]

Thanks a lot for all the good advice.

Gassho,

Uggy,
Sat today

[Tomás ESP]

How do you strop trying to fix yourself during zazen ?

to

How do you stop trying to fix yourself during zazen ?

There is nothing to fix, everything is a shining jewel as it is, even wrong spelling is perfectly, rightly "wrong spelling."

Yet, even so, I fixed your spelling. How's that?!

(A Koan)

Gassho, J

STLah

Gassho, Tomás
Sat&LaH

[Chet]

Hello !

Lately i'm going through a bit of a "zazen" crisis. I noticed more and more that when i'm practicing, i'm always trying to FIX something. I'm not relaxed enough ; i'm not paying attention enough ; i have too many thoughts or i have too few thoughts ; i'm too anxious and should not be cause there are no reasons to ; etc., etc. Always fixating on myself on how to make it "better". I know the answer : when you notice you are doing this, just go back to the breathe or to the posture and let it go ; but that in itself IS somehow trying to fix something. I also notice that this very "trying to fix myself" is what makes me feel bad in the first place, so id' like to stop it ! I also feel bad cause i'm far from practicing for the sake of others...

How do you stop trying to fix yourself ?

Gassho,

Uggy,
Sat Today,
About to LAH

“What, in this moment, is lacking?”
—attributed to Linji

Chet
ST/LAH

[Sharan]

When your mind starts acting like a child, stamping around and throwing temper tantrums, don't be angry at it. Just realize what it's doing and continue sitting. This might sound like the classic zen stuff you read on the net, but it basically is the only thing you can do. Sometimes, when the mind is really strong, I switch to imagining a sound of waves, and they wash away the thoughts. It is helpful if you have music stuck in your head like I did this morning

Sharan
SjeoDanas-SatToday