The Duality of Duck Season/Rabbit Season

[Tobiishi]

By seeking a quiet place for zazen, I imply a noisy place is less desirable. By fashioning a soft cushion, I say it is better than a hard one. 20 minutes is better than 5. Falling asleep is bad when staying awake is good... how on earth do we transcend duality?

Perhaps Lin-chi said it:
"...The passions exist dependent on mind:
Have no-mind, and how can they bind you?
Without troubling to discriminate or cling to forms,
You attain the Way naturally in a moment of time."

Or maybe it was Buggs Bunny...
https://<div class="videocontainer w... </a> </div>

Gassho
(duck season, IMHO)

[will]

Re: The Duality of Duck Season/Rabbit Season

When Zazen becomes Zazen I guess.

W

[Jinho]

Re: The Duality of Duck Season/Rabbit Season

By seeking a quiet place for zazen, I imply a noisy place is less desirable. By fashioning a soft cushion, I say it is better than a hard one. 20 minutes is better than 5. Falling asleep is bad when staying awake is good... how on earth do we transcend duality?

Gassho
(duck season, IMHO)

Greetings,

I think you may be expressing a confusion between Form and No-Form, relative and absolute. Both exist absolutely (and relatively) at the same time (and the same place) which is everywhere/everytime. And while this interexistence of form/no-form is absolute, at each moment (because we live in the world of form (as well as no-form)) I have to make choices. In every moment I am making a choice. I even have to make choices in the future (e.g. I set my alarm clock for the next morning). And while the nonexistence (which, in my very limited understanding, I understand to mean impermanence ) is absolute, the world of form is right there, in my face. And Emotions are also in the world of form (like/dislike). And while it is important for me not to be deluded by emotions, I also think that as I try to live more and more an ethical life, it is important for me to be gentle and caring towards my own emotions as I (hope to be) towards others emotions.

I think it is that a noisy place is usually less expedient to doing zazen as there is something very significant when I move into aural silence (and physical stillness). A thick cushion is expedient so that one can sit zazen without being forced to do "koan study" on the koan OWWWWWWWWWWW !!!!!

All zen writings I have read specifically say that to "transcend" is to deny the oneness of all phenomena. That transcendence is an illusion (but perhaps a useful one if it "gets you through the night")

gassho,
rowan

[Jundo]

Re: The Duality of Duck Season/Rabbit Season

While we usually sit Zazen in a still and quiet room with few distractions ... because a quiet environment facilitates a quiet mind ...

... I also recommend that folks sit Zazen very very frequently in anything but a quiet environment ... downtown in the city, near a noisy and smelly construction site, by a highway on ramp, on a crowded subway (even if ya can't sit and are hanging by a strap) ...

http://blog.beliefnet.com/treeleafzen/2 ... er-co.html

http://blog.beliefnet.com/treeleafzen/2 ... sic-1.html

http://blog.beliefnet.com/treeleafzen/2 ... ta-za.html

... because the true "quiet room" is not a place, nor is it outside us. And if one can only sit Zazen when it is quiet, then it is not Zazen.

So, try to sit in such a noisy, smelly or disagreeable place every couple of weeks or, if an "Insta-Zazen", each day.

Gassho, Jundo

[Tobiishi]

Re: The Duality of Duck Season/Rabbit Season

Thanks Rowan and Jundo... sometimes I drift out on the sea of philosophy, and its good to have people on shore to yank me back

[Jinho]

Re: The Duality of Duck Season/Rabbit Season

Thanks Rowan and Jundo... sometimes I drift out on the sea of philosophy, and its good to have people on shore to yank me back

Thank you for your thank you! It is very nice to hear.

gassho,
rowan

[Jinho]

Re: The Duality of Duck Season/Rabbit Season

While we usually sit Zazen in a still and quiet room with few distractions ... because a quiet environment facilitates a quiet mind ...

... I also recommend that folks sit Zazen very very frequently in anything but a quiet environment ... downtown in the city, near a noisy and smelly construction site, by a highway on ramp, on a crowded subway (even if ya can't sit and are hanging by a strap) ...


So, try to sit in such a noisy, smelly or disagreeable place every couple of weeks or, if an "Insta-Zazen", each day.

Gassho, Jundo

Jundo, thank you for this! You may be the first zen teacher to explicitly encourage this! And of course this is in accord with all the ancient zen teachers who said that if one only lives a quiet life then what will we do when something (which is not quiet) happens?

Hey! I just thought of something! I have always thought of Mountains and Rivers (as in Dogen's writing on same) only as outside myself. But perhaps it is also that I am also Mountains and Rivers. I was walking down the street one day, near me and suddenly very clearly experienced "All Mine!Everything I see, All Mine!". Not in the sense that I had a controlling possession of everything, but.... (words failing me). But it is perhaps more "All Me!". But I am sure you will have some words to cut through this delusion :wink:

gassho,
jinho/rowan

[Jundo]

Re: The Duality of Duck Season/Rabbit Season

Hey! I just thought of something! I have always thought of Mountains and Rivers (as in Dogen's writing on same) only as outside myself. But perhaps it is also that I am also Mountains and Rivers. I was walking down the street one day, near me and suddenly very clearly experienced "All Mine!Everything I see, All Mine!". Not in the sense that I had a controlling possession of everything, but.... (words failing me). But it is perhaps more "All Me!". But I am sure you will have some words to cut through this delusion :wink:

gassho,
jinho/rowan

:wink:

Preceptor Kai of Mt. Dayang addressed the assembly, saying, "The blue mountains are constantly walking. The stone woman gives birth to a child in the night."

The mountains lack none of their proper virtues; hence, they are constantly at rest and constantly walking. We must devote ourselves to a detailed study of this virtue of walking. Since the walking of the mountains should be like that of people, one ought not doubt that the mountains walk simply because they may not appear to stride like humans.

This saying of the buddha and ancestor [Daokai] has pointed out walking; it has got what is fundamental, and we should thoroughly investigate this address on "constant walking". It is constant because it is walking. Although the walking of the blue mountains is faster than "swift as the wind", those in the mountains do not sense this, do not know it. To be "in the mountains" is "a flower opening within the world". Those outside the mountains do not sense this, do not know it. Those without eyes to see the mountains, do not sense, do not know, do not see, do not hear the reason for this. To doubt the walking of the mountains means that one does not yet know one's own walking. It is not that one does not walk but that one does not yet know, has not made clear, this walking. Those who would know their own walking must also know the walking of the blue mountains

The blue mountains are not sentient; they are not insentient. We ourselves are not sentient; we are not insentient. We can have no doubts about these blue mountains walking. We do not know what measure of dharma realms would be necessary to clarify the blue mountains. We should do a clear accounting of the blue mountains' walking and our own walking, including an accounting of both "stepping back and back stepping". We should do an accounting of the fact that, since the very time "before any subtle sign", since "the other side of the King of Emptiness", walking by stepping forward and back has never stopped for a moment.

http://hcbss.stanford.edu/research/proj ... ation.html

[Tobiishi]

Re: The Duality of Duck Season/Rabbit Season

Thanks Jundo for that translation of #29... being a fan of translation diversity, I would like to submit the master link for that series for anyone interested in reading more: http://hcbss.stanford.edu/research/p...ztp/index.html

gassho