I rank, or maybe not

[Meishin]

Gassho
john

[alan.r]

You are walking the mountain, the mountain is walking you, there is just mountain walking mountain, mountain mountaining mountain, walking walks walking. All Buddha Mountain.

And as one walks ahead or stops to rest for a time, gets lost or finds a good path, moves smoothly or stumbles and falls in the mud ... all is Buddha Mountain. How does one try to "get to" Buddha mountain when one stands on ... nay, stands AS ... Buddha Mountain? Where is Buddha Mountain to search for Buddha Mountain?

Yes, we may get lost or fall ... but there is nothing to lose and no place to fall apart from Buddha Mountain. Nonetheless, we get up, dust off, try to find the trail again ... push on, making real progress with time. A climber of many years is better equipped to stay on the good trails ... not fall off the cliff or into the poison ivy ... than the neophyte climber of but a day (Thus, although there is no place to go and nothing to attain, we do get better at it! ) )

Some folks believe that Buddhahood is many mountains away ... and it will take many lives to reach there. Because they believe so, it becomes so.

Some folks find that Buddhahood was in every step, and the stepping itself ... but that there are ways to climb like Buddha and ways to climb like a fool. One may wander after mirages and go in circles, lost in Ignorance, Anger and Greed ... or one may find the Mountain as one's True Self, One's True Home.

We make real progess in discovering that the point of the hike was never the destination, but the hike itself ... each step by step the Total Arrival and Total Realization of Buddha Mountain.

And so with sitting Zazen, just sitting sits sitting with no place to go. 'Tis not our usual human "goal and destination" way of viewing life.

Gassho, J

Thank you and Gassho.