I put my foot in my mouth on a regular basis, and I usually don't realize it. Zen sometimes makes us feel high and mighty, like we "get it". Unfortunately, I often fall into that trap; especially because I seem to be the token Buddhist among a large group of people and often have questions bounced off of me. So of course, after awhile I start liking to listen to sound of my own squawking.
It does take a certain special kind of person to rip the soap-box your standing on out from under your feet, luckily I have good friends. A friend shared the story of the monk carrying the woman across the river that she had heard in class. Once again on my high horse, I felt the need to assure her that I had heard it, but I listened anyway. Then I went on to complain about what a professor had said earlier, etc...
Then I went to bed a few hours later, set up my cushion for sitting, sat, breathed, and opened my eyes. If anyone needed to drop the woman at the bank, it was me. Carrying resentment, carrying stress, carrying guilt, carrying arrogance, leave them on the bank of the river. Zen won't teach you a thing - life will.
100 bows for the ones who open our eyes,
Taylor
here's a link to the story for those who haven't read it:
http://www.trivia-library.com/a/educati ... -woman.htm
It does take a certain special kind of person to rip the soap-box your standing on out from under your feet, luckily I have good friends. A friend shared the story of the monk carrying the woman across the river that she had heard in class. Once again on my high horse, I felt the need to assure her that I had heard it, but I listened anyway. Then I went on to complain about what a professor had said earlier, etc...
Then I went to bed a few hours later, set up my cushion for sitting, sat, breathed, and opened my eyes. If anyone needed to drop the woman at the bank, it was me. Carrying resentment, carrying stress, carrying guilt, carrying arrogance, leave them on the bank of the river. Zen won't teach you a thing - life will.
100 bows for the ones who open our eyes,
Taylor
here's a link to the story for those who haven't read it:
http://www.trivia-library.com/a/educati ... -woman.htm
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