Forgetting Zazen?

[Onken]

A funny thing has been happeneing lately and I would like to know if anyone has had similiar experiences. I generally sit in the morning (for the most part), then go about my day, work, chores, the daily grind and then sometimes ask myself.....did I sit today? Sometimes it's like it never happened. I know that I did, but sometimes it is like it never happened. Weird or normal?

Gassho,

Matt

[Nindo]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

Same here. I don't think it's weird. I think it means that sitting has become a normal part of my day like brushing my teeth.

[Hoyu]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

What's Zazen?

Sorry with a title like that I couldn't resist :twisted:
I haven't experienced this. I do my sitting in the late evening so there isn't an opportunity afterwards to go about my busy day only to look back and ponder whether I've done it or not. If I sat in the morning, like you, I'm sure it would happen at some point.
I have had something else happen which is kind of similar. Sometimes I'll wake up with this overwhelming sensation that I've forgotten to feed or walk the dog. Well that alone is not so weird, but the fact that he passed away 3 or so years ago certainly makes it!

Gassho,
John

[Hans]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

Hello,

I usually sit in the morning and in the evening and know the exact same feeling you just described. Since it's nearly always the same place, the same cushion, the same smells (unless one of our cats has felt the need to mark their territory...which technically shouldn't include the house since they do not even pay any rent...but hey, what can you do )....I guess my short term memory seems to get lazy once in a while and assumes that I definitely did sit Usually I can really feel the difference though, especially after a long day at the office.

To cut the long story short, I think it's perfectly normal to have that feeling once in a while.


Gassho,

Hans Chudo Mongen

[Seiryu]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

Just to add some thoughts,

It might be that your zazen is becoming just another habit, and you might not be really engaged in your practice. Maybe throw it some chants and bows to truly bring yourself back to what you are doing. Shinkantaza has a trap, it can very quickly become a dead body on a round zafu...


Just some thoughts...

[Onken]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

Thanks everyone.....Seiryu-san....I think you are right, good insight, maybe time to time it IS becoming just that..habitual in a sense.

[Taylor]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

Just to add some thoughts,

It might be that your zazen is becoming just another habit, and you might not be really engaged in your practice. Maybe throw it some chants and bows to truly bring yourself back to what you are doing. Shinkantaza has a trap, it can very quickly become a dead body on a round zafu...


Just some thoughts...

In the same way, maybe it's not. What's so special about zazen? It's just brushing your teeth, taking a walk, getting the paper. No need to make it special, because everything is special. Yes, it can become a dead body by not truly applying oneself, but it can also become a dead body by assigning some magical importance to it.

Zazen is a complete waste of time, and that's why it's unique. But again, just my thoughts as well

[Jundo]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

Just to add some thoughts,

It might be that your zazen is becoming just another habit, and you might not be really engaged in your practice. Maybe throw it some chants and bows to truly bring yourself back to what you are doing. Shinkantaza has a trap, it can very quickly become a dead body on a round zafu...


Just some thoughts...

Hi Seiryu,

While I agree with this point, that Zazen can become a trap of complacency, that we can just come to take it for granted or start sitting like a bump on a dead log, twiddling our thumbs while the time passes ...

... yet I would not seek to add anything to Zazen to make it more, even to make it more "alive" in some way. Rather, I would stop and truly sit. That is the life of Zazen. I sometimes write this about Zazen:

So, if someone were to think I am saying, "All you need to do in Zazen is sit down on one's hindquarters, and that's enough ... just twiddle your thumbs in the 'Cosmic Mudra' and you are Buddha" then, respectfully, I believe they do not get my point. But if they understand, "There is absolutely no place to be, where one needs to be or elsewhere where one can be, than on that Zafu in that moment, and that moment itself is all complete, all-encompassing, always at home, the total doing of All Life, Time and Space fully realized" ... they are closer to the flavor. . Then, if they rise up from the Zafu ... sensing that they are "Buddha" ... and then try to act in life a bit more how a Buddha would act, they get the point.


Zazen seeks no change, needs no change, is complete and whole ... and that realization works a revolutionary change. ...

Does that make sense ... in a Zenny way?

So, instead of adding more decoration to Zazen, and instead of trying to take away from Zazen something that is displeasing ... just sit with/in/as the above attitude. That's all one needs.

I very much accord with Taylor in this:

What's so special about zazen? It's just brushing your teeth, taking a walk, getting the paper. No need to make it special, because everything is special. Yes, it can become a dead body by not truly applying oneself, but it can also become a dead body by assigning some magical importance to it.

Zazen is a complete waste of time, and that's why it's unique. But again, just my thoughts as well

Gassho, Jundo

[Shokai]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

Sorry to disappoint anyone but I have been cursed with this memory that many people have remarked about. After seventy years it is becoming slightly fuzzy around the edges but I find the sit every morning helps to sharpen it up.

[Seiryu]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

Just to add some thoughts,

It might be that your zazen is becoming just another habit, and you might not be really engaged in your practice. Maybe throw it some chants and bows to truly bring yourself back to what you are doing. Shinkantaza has a trap, it can very quickly become a dead body on a round zafu...


Just some thoughts...

In the same way, maybe it's not. What's so special about zazen? It's just brushing your teeth, taking a walk, getting the paper. No need to make it special, because everything is special. Yes, it can become a dead body by not truly applying oneself, but it can also become a dead body by assigning some magical importance to it.

Zazen is a complete waste of time, and that's why it's unique. But again, just my thoughts as well

Zazen is a complete waste of time, yes indeed. Bringing yourself back to practice with more intensity is not giving zazen any magical importance at all. In fact it is taking some magical importance away. To sit zazen with out really being present to it is like expecting the mere fact of sitting to do all the work.


Zazen is just zazen. Treating it as something special, or saying it is not something special, is still adding to it. When you approach zazen with a concept of what it should be it is no longer zazen, it is just another idea...drop even the idea of zazen completely...

just some more thoughts... :mrgreen:

[Jundo]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

Zazen is a complete waste of time, yes indeed. Bringing yourself back to practice with more intensity is not giving zazen any magical importance at all. In fact it is taking some magical importance away. To sit zazen with out really being present to it is like expecting the mere fact of sitting to do all the work.


Zazen is just zazen. Treating it as something special, or saying it is not something special, is still adding to it. When you approach zazen with a concept of what it should be it is no longer zazen, it is just another idea...drop even the idea of zazen completely...

just some more thoughts... :mrgreen:

'Tis a tricky thing, everyone here right in a way.

To sit intently seeking more intensity in sitting is -not- Zazen. (or perhaps, better said, since all of life is Zazen, 'tis a narrow Zazen)

To sit intently, neither seeking intensly or seeking anything at all ... radically allowing intense moments to be intense ... dull moments to be dull ... is intense Zazen. Intensely seek non-seeking.

Tricky!

For newcomers to Shikantaza, more on such tricky tricks here:

viewtopic.php?p=20605#p20605

Gassho, J

[Jundo]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

Taylor said ...

Zazen is a complete waste of time, and that's why it's unique.

Fortunately, we Zen folks really don't believe in time, or anything in the universe possibly to waste. Now, don't waste time and get to it! 8)

Life can never be more life, whether an intense moment or a dull moment ... all life. Life can never be more full, and our mind makes it seem empty. Life is always emptiness, which is full of life!

Now, intensely realize that fact, and live a full life!

Tricky!

Gassho, J

[Seiryu]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

'Tis a tricky thing, everyone here right in a way.

To sit intently seeking more intensity in sitting is -not- Zazen. (or perhaps, better said, since all of life is Zazen, 'tis a narrow Zazen)

To sit intently, neither seeking intensly or seeking anything at all ... radically allowing intense moments to be intense ... dull moments to be dull ... is intense Zazen. Intensely seek non-seeking.

Tricky!

Gassho!

[Seiryu]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

just a question:

To allow the intense moment to just be and the dull moments to just be, doesn't that require us to be fully aware of them. To see the moments as thus, and to let them be?

I can think of two kinds of just letting be. One in awareness, and one in LaLa land. Where we let things be just because we weren't paying attention to them....

[Taylor]

Re: Forgetting Zazen?

'Tis a tricky thing, everyone here right in a way.

To sit intently seeking more intensity in sitting is -not- Zazen. (or perhaps, better said, since all of life is Zazen, 'tis a narrow Zazen)

To sit intently, neither seeking intensly or seeking anything at all ... radically allowing intense moments to be intense ... dull moments to be dull ... is intense Zazen. Intensely seek non-seeking.

Tricky!

Gassho!

And one to you as well, mon amie.