Guilt, Zazen, and the Precepts

[Guest]

I have been having an experience lately where I rise from Zazen in the morning in a certain positive state, then as the day proceeds at work, I find myself breaking Precepts right away. By the evening Zazen, I am struggling with feelings of guilt for breaking the Precepts during the day. Does Zazen eventually help keeping the Precepts easier?

Gassho

John

SatToday LAH

[Tai Shi]

Guilt, Zazen, and the Precepts

This year marks my sixth year undtakeing the precepts not taking my first year or my third year, Gratitude is for study not guilty of me. I know my path isn’t painful.
Gassho
st/ lah


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[Hōkan]

When I sit in zazen I keep all the precepts. (Didn't Dōgen say something like that?) At other times it's sometimes a bit of a challenge. I don't feel too much guilt, but I do note the ways I could improve my efforts.

Sat.

[Kokuu]

Hi John

As well as offering guidance to life, I increasingly see the precepts as a way of bringing awareness to our actions. I think it is that awareness that is of greatest importance, in shining a light on how we live.

You could also recite the Verse of Atonement after evening Zazen:

All harmful acts, words and thoughts
Ever committed by me since of old
On account of beginningless greed, anger and ignorance
Born of my body, mouth and mind
Now I atone for them all.


Each day is a new beginning, as is each moment.

Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday-

[Nengei]

I have been having an experience lately where I rise from Zazen in the morning in a certain positive state, then as the day proceeds at work, I find myself breaking Precepts right away. By the evening Zazen, I am struggling with feelings of guilt for breaking the Precepts during the day. Does Zazen eventually help keeping the Precepts easier?

Please excuse any unintended appearance that I am trying to teach or explain anything. I am preparing for ordination as a novice priest, and have no depth of knowledge or qualifications for teaching Zen.

Please forgive my verbosity. A couple of points based on my own experience:

Zazen offers nothing. I do find that consistency in sitting regularly (daily or twice a day, at least), helps me to keep my mind where I want it. Does that always mean adhering to the precepts, 100%? Of course not. It helps me to remember who I am.

Guilt is the living emotion of attachment. If you are feeling guilty, you are holding on to something that does not exist any longer. It is, then, an object for letting go of. That does not mean you should never feel guilt, or that guilt cannot have positive outcomes---like it is having for you today.

Lastly, the Precepts are conceptually dynamic, because they are ideas that exist within our own philosophical framework. Not stabbing someone is pretty clear, but not killing their concept of self with microaggressions is not so clear. Sometimes we have few options. Being in this world is a process, not a destination. Go with the flow.

Also, we have some pretty good listeners in our Sangha.

Gassho,
然芸 Nengei
Sat today. LAH.

[Tomás ESP]

"A senior monk and a junior monk were traveling together. At one point, they came to a river with a strong current. As the monks were preparing to cross the river, they saw a very young and beautiful woman also attempting to cross. The young woman asked if they could help her cross to the other side.

The two monks glanced at one another because they had taken vows not to touch a woman.
Then, without a word, the older monk picked up the woman, carried her across the river, placed her gently on the other side, and carried on his journey.
The younger monk couldn’t believe what had just happened. After rejoining his companion, he was speechless, and an hour passed without a word between them.

Two more hours passed, then three, finally the younger monk could contain himself any longer, and blurted out “As monks, we are not permitted a woman, how could you then carry that woman on your shoulders?”

The older monk looked at him and replied, “Brother, I set her down on the other side of the river, why are you still carrying her?”

Gassho, Tomás
Sat&LaH

Sorry for running long.

[Prashanth]

Guilt. Heavy word, eh.

If you purposely broke the precepts, the word is justified as a response of your conscience.
But if you did not do it on purpose, and it happened because you are still learning to keep up with the precepts, then guilt is unnecessary.

We are all learning. If we kept feeling guilty about falling off a bicycle, we would have never learned how to ride it after all.

Gassho.
Sorry to run long.

Sat lah.

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[Juki]

Zazen is keeping the precepts. The rest of life is harder. Recite the verse of atonement and the four vows after zazen and be kinder to yourself. We all fail sometimes. That's part of the beauty of this earthly existence.

Gassho
Juki
sat today and lah

apologies for going long

[houst0n]

Zazen is keeping the precepts. The rest of life is harder. Recite the verse of atonement and the four vows after zazen and be kinder to yourself. We all fail sometimes. That's part of the beauty of this earthly existence.

Gassho
Juki
sat today and lah

apologies for going long

Hmm. And what if you're failing every time? Zazen isn't about keeping the precepts, why do you think it is? How ridiculous.

Don't get me wrong, our sadness is even more ridiculous. We know the answer to it, we always did. We know how to fix it, I mean, in theory.. Reciting some vows? What's the point? What are you suggesting here?

And yet, here we are again. Miserable, drunk, escaping, alone, scared.

Step by step life goes on. And maybe we make it to the exit from suffering or we don't. Turns out, this goal wasn't much of a goal to begin with.

Love to all, alongside a cold and a broken hallelujah.

Gassho,
./sat
Neil

[Juki]

I didn't say zazen was "about" keeping the precepts, I said zazen "is" keeping the precepts. And I will stay with that. Sitting zazen IS keeping the precepts, and keeping them perfectly. What happens after zazen happens. And then you sit zazen again and recite your chants again and get off your cushion again and try again. As for asking about the point of the vows, I don't know where to begin. Our forms and rituals are crucial to our practice. Recite the vows wholeheartedly and you become the vows. Rituals get into your bones.

Gassho,
Juki

sat today and lah

Apologize for going long

[houst0n]

I didn't say zazen was "about" keeping the precepts, I said zazen "is" keeping the precepts. And I will stay with that. Sitting zazen IS keeping the precepts, and keeping them perfectly.

Gassho,
Juki

sat today and lah

Well, you're not wrong. It's indeed very hard to kill someone while sitting in zazen. What does that have to do with the rest of life though? Should we just sit zazen 24 hours a day and then that's all the precepts ticked? Problem solved! Let's all sit zazen 24/7!

Although, my thoughts on zazen is it has nothing at all to do with precepts. Precepts absolutely are incompatible with zazen in my view. They're for 'real life' not our time in zazen. Sure, we attain them automatically in zazen, but we also obtain 'not eating ice cream' in exactly the same manner as 'not painting pictures', 'not singing songs' or 'not cleaning the toilet' as we do the precepts while we sit in zazen.

Saying 'we keep the precepts' while sitting zazen is like saying (and being attached to) 'I don't do backflips while I'm reading a book'. Of course you don't, because you can't. That's not an insight, it's reality. You can't break the precepts (or most of them) while sitting quietly looking at the wall.

So we're keeping all the precepts on the cushion, automatically, ok? We're even keeping more than that on the cushion. This doesn't mean we keep (or even remember) them in life. And keeping the precepts in life is MUCH more important (and holy shit, more difficult) than anything that goes on, on the cushion.

This kind of hand wavey 'it's all ok since we are good in zazen' is actually, in my mind pure escapism: you're putting off dealing with your actual life; and I don't agree with it. The precepts stand outside Zazen. You have to actually make an effort to follow them. Zazen is outside of any of this sort of effort and our practice, rare as it is, doesn't excuse a lack of effort in your actual life.

So, in that regard -- I fail to see how your statement is relevant to the question the original poster asked.

You seem to be saying that everything is simply 'all ok' because they (we?) also sit per day with 'no ice cream' (or whatever precepts)? You recon that's enough?

It's not for me, and it sounds like it's not enough for the OP either.

gassho
./sat --lah
neil

[Tai Shi]

Guilt, Zazen, and the Precepts

It is my understanding that novice priests aren’t allowed to teach. What experience would a young man bring to teaching me with no experience? Who do you think I am? I ask the opinion of 73-yr old men and 76. I call them my trusted friends. I am 70. One is Buddhist the other Catholic.
The Buddha starved himself for 12 years.
st/lah


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[Kokuu]

And yet, here we are again. Miserable, drunk, escaping, alone, scared.

Step by step life goes on. And maybe we make it to the exit from suffering or we don't. Turns out, this goal wasn't much of a goal to begin with.

Love to all, alongside a cold and a broken hallelujah.

Hey Neil

It sounds like you might be having a rough ride just now. In Zen we don't try not to feel all of those things and they are part of life, but I know from experience that too many days feeling alone and scared is no fun, and the idea of being free from suffering can feel like just some kind of unattainable made-up idea.

As you doubtless know, we sit with what is going on for us right here and right now. However, there is a reason for the importance of sangha, and at times we see that we need the support of others, whether in the sangha, or outside of it, to sit with us, or help in other ways.

I could give you all kinds of Zenny stuff about the precepts and Zazen but it doesn't sound like what you need just now. Hey, maybe this wasn't what you needed either.

Feel free to write me if you want to chat. It is 00.40 now so I am going to bed but will pick up in the morning.

Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday-

[Jakuden]

There isn’t “enough” for most humans, which is Dukkha in a nutshell! Zen practice, over time, can help us suffer less… but interestingly that involves dropping all our attachment to goals, including the goals of keeping precepts and suffering less! It does involve a bit of a leap of faith. But as Kokuu said that’s what Sangha is for, to hold each other up during periods of hard practice, and to remind each other that the peace we sometimes glimpse during Zazen is there all the time, like the sun behind the clouds.

To save all sentient beings, though beings numberless
Transform all delusions, though delusions inexhaustible
To perceive reality, though reality is boundless
To attain the enlightened way, a way unattainable.

Gassho
Jakuden
SatToday/ LAH


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[Rich]

Hi John

As well as offering guidance to life, I increasingly see the precepts as a way of bringing awareness to our actions. I think it is that awareness that is of greatest importance, in shining a light on how we live.

You could also recite the Verse of Atonement after evening Zazen:

All harmful acts, words and thoughts
Ever committed by me since of old
On account of beginningless greed, anger and ignorance
Born of my body, mouth and mind
Now I atone for them all.


Each day is a new beginning, as is each moment.

Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday-

Yes to awareness. Then you keep the precepts without thinking about them

Sat/lah


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