...and there you have it...I rest my case!
Sat Today
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Nah, doesn't work Jishin.....sorry - I by far prefer Jundo's (and others) insight and patience!
...here, let me save you the time
No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.........................
I am off for a pint
....simple!
Sat todayComment
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Yes!Nah, doesn't work Jishin.....sorry - I by far prefer Jundo's (and others) insight and patience!
...here, let me save you the time
No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.........................
I am off for a pint ....simple!
Gassho, Jishin, _/st\_Comment
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The sitting is easy. Capturing it in words.... there lies the problem!There must be something hard about all this, otherwise it would be simple and this thread would not be as long as it is
Don't let all of the flowery language around shikantaza make you think it is something complex. It really isn't.
The mind, however, can often make it seem so.
Gassho
Kokuu
#sattodayComment
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Well put ugrok; Those were exactly my thoughts till a few months back. But without intention (and/or an object) it seems the noticing will be much lesser. We might think we are noticing and coming back fine but in reality we are moving from one thought-chain to another without really letting go (just like what Bryson says). My alternate instruction is exactly what you are describing. I am asking noticing happens anyway, why have an additional instruction to ungrab or let go? But Zen teachers seem to think otherwise and I believe they must be correct
With this new rule, it has become difficult for me to sit non-judgmentally. I feel you cannot do both. Sit non-judgmentally, non-manipulatively and then have a slight rule not to grab on (or ungrab when caught up). They both are conflicting in my view. I either have to sit with clear intent to return and be busy with that OR I sit non-judgmentally (not worry about getting caught up too as mentioned in "alternate" instruction as noticing happens anyway).
Gassho,
Sam
Sat TodayComment
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Okay, i understand better what you're saying !
Or maybe zen teachers just want to give us ways to be less prisoners of thoughts, because, mostly, thoughts make us suffer. In the end they do not matter, but maybe we are and feel better when we think less. The focusing techniques sure help to "think" less. Maybe it's their only purpose, which has not to be confused with zazen itself ?
But anyway, this stuff must be highly paradoxical, as always in zen. Maybe if we people did not think so much, zen teachers would teach us to think more. Apparently Suzuki once said to a student that was confronting him on the questions of sameness and difference : "You guys are stuck on the difference side, so i teach sameness. If you would be stuck on the sameness side, i would teach difference".
Maybe our zazen should not be "this" OR "that" and we should not come to it with premade ideas but only with very simple instructions. The instructions, as given by Jundo for example, seem clear and simple enough to me : sit, and when you notice you are caught, then ungrab. Period. No big deal and no problem with that. No matter if it happens by itself or not, no matter if you question it or not. It maybe goes beyond our trying to understand ?Comment
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Hi Sam,
I think you don't get the lovely game here. Let me try again:
Yes, this is so. Yet when we truly sit free of judgment and expectation, something WONDERFUL is found and EVERYTHING is ours. In fact, you can most definitely count on that. anticipate it, plan and work for it and take it to the bank: namely, this wonderful treasure realized through dropping judgments, desires and expectations.
Yes, "whatever happens is okay". that is absolutely true. However, that DOES NOT mean that "whatever happens is okay", because sitting in "whatever happens is okay complacency" is NOT ok, and neither is it okay to judge "ok vs. not ok". Judging "ok vs not ok" is NOT ok!
What is truly "okay" is only to radically sit beyond and right through "okay vs. not okay" until a "Big O" Okay manifests which swallows whole and spits out all the things of this world that are okay and not okay.
Okay?
There ARE rules and proper methods to Zazen. The rules are to not get caught up in thoughts, to sit as the one perfect action in that moment, and to drop all thoughts of "rules and methods" to non-attain Buddha Mirrormind (called "non-attain" because present all along, so no reason or path to attain it). Why? Because the mirror has no "method" to be the mirror, but just sits as mirror. The mirror does not have a method or goal to become the mirror. Thus, our "method" is to sit dropping all methods and goals. If we have a method or goal to become mirrorlike, we make it as if we are standing apart from the mirror (we are never in actuality, although we feel so). Thus, the "method" is that there is no "method".We are introducing rules now. Something that is supposed to happen (and not supposed to happen) during Zazen. Manipulating our Zazen slightly. Redirecting it gently from the "natural" course to what we want it to be.
The "rule" is to drop all thought of "right Zazen" or "wrong Zazen". However, that does NOT mean that all Zazen is "right Zazen". Why? Sitting while judging "right vs. wrong Zazen" is wrong Zazen. Also, sitting while tangled up in thoughts and wallowing in emotions (especially of greed, anger and division) is wrong. A key part of not getting tangled up and wallowing, however, is to drop all thought of "right Zazen vs. wrong". Doing so is "right Zazen"!
Zazen is sitting "free of judgement". Yes, that is a judgement ... and it is also a judgment that the best way to sit "free of judgments" is to drop all judgments."don't grab on to thoughts. if you find yourself caught up then ungrab". don't you think adding a rule like this adds judgments to the non-judgmental sitting? whether we want it or not isn't there a judgment when we grab on (oh this is not supposed to happen). "Whatever happens in sitting is okay" has now become "Whatever happens in sitting is okay except getting caught up".
However, "dropping judgments" and sitting in a Buddha's Radical Acceptance of this beautiful-ugly world MUST NOT be confused with complacency or tired resignation. Don't think that sitting "free of judgement" is sitting "free of judgement". Far from it. When I drop all judgements, beyond right and wrong, I taste a world in which there is no father who killed his child, no child to suffer and no death. At the same time, I am filled with the judgement that these events were a sad tragedy and my heart breaks. Therefore, I might say I that I sit in radical Buddha "Non-Judgement" which simultaneously allows me, as a human being, to be filled with judgements, a kind of Judgementless-judgement.
As stated above, saying "whatever happens is okay" does not mean that "whatever crap happens is okay". The only "Truly Okay" is a radical affirmation of this life-self-world as fundamentally being "whatever happens is okay, beyond and right through the happy and the crappy without a gappy, as the light shines though". Nonetheless, sad crap happens, and that IS NOT okay! So, we have Okay-not-Okay at once!
I don't think it happens by itself, and I do worry about being caught up in thoughts/emotions and I do try to be free of thoughts. Did you believe I was saying otherwise?Instead of the above ungrab instruction, why not this "alternate" instruction/non-instruction: "In sitting, getting caught up and coming back to awareness happens by itself. don't worry about either. we don't sit and try to intentionally/purposefully think about something. Other than that whatever "getting caught up and coming back" that is naturally happening is fine. we don't judge or worry about it."
However (and this is the trick) the only way to stop being "caught up in thoughts" is to stop thinking about the thoughts, being "caught up" or "not caught up" and anything else. The best way to be free of emotions is to stop emoting, including the worry about the emotions. The best way to be "free of thoughts" is to stop trying to be free, to stop chasing freedom ... and just to rest free. In other words, the best way to be free of the annoying drip drip drip is not to try to stop thinking about the drip, but just to drop the drip. One sits with the intent to sit sincerely and with dedication, beyond having intent or no intent.
This is why you do not get it perhaps. You keep thinking in an "either/or alternative" way. Can you taste how one must sit TRANSCENDING judgments and nonjudgement, manipulation and nonmanipulation, thought and no thought, intent or no intent, etc.?I feel you cannot do both. Sit non-judgmentally, non-manipulatively and then have a slight rule not to grab on (or ungrab when caught up). They both are conflicting. I either have to sit with clear intent to return and be busy with that OR I sit non-judgmentally (not worry about getting caught up too as mentioned in "alternate" instruction)
Such is what so many of the old, classic Koans are on about.
I mean, what is there to attain if already in hand, how does one "become" Buddha? Thus, kinda good policy to stop trying to "attain" and quit striving "to become". However, that does not mean we stop trying to attain and become! Far from it, we are striving to attain non-attaining, trying to become non-becoming. The only way to "attain non-attaining" and to "become non-becoming" is to radically, to the marrow, drop all need to attain and become, realizing that which cannot be attained and ceaselessly becomes without becoming.Momonkan Case 9
興陽讓和尚、因僧問、大通智勝佛、十劫坐道場、佛法不現前、不得成佛道時如何。
A monk asked Kõyõ Seijõ, "Daitsû Chishõ Buddha sat in zazen for ten kalpas and could not attain Buddhahood. He did not become a Buddha. How could this be?"
讓曰、其問甚諦當。
Seijõ said, "Your question is quite self-explanatory."
僧云、既是坐道場、爲甚麼不得成佛道。
The monk asked, "He meditated so long; why could he not attain Buddhahood?"
讓曰、爲伊不成佛。
Seijõ said, "Because he did not become a Buddha."
This is also the reason that Sekkei Harada Roshi, in that book you pointed out Sam, is so seemingly caught in contradictions page after page, talking out of both sides of his no sided mouth. On the one hand, he says,
butThese days, expressions like "making a great effort" or "wholehearted devotion" are nearly dead. The people who wrote down these records (earlier he was talking about Blue Cliff koan record) did so as a result of really grinding their bodies into powder as they exerted themselves to the utmost. Only as a result of that effort were they able to write that the self and the Dharma are one.
Just a bundle of seeming contraditions that ain't.I made every effort, always trying to be one with my sitting. I sat so single-mindedly that even in the winter I would be bathed in sweat, clenching my teeth. But I gradually realized that ... because of trying to do my best and myself and always thinking that I had to do it, there was actually a gap between Zazen and my method of sitting.
Gassho, J
SatTodayLast edited by Jundo; 01-09-2015, 05:37 PM.ALL OF LIFE IS OUR TEMPLEComment
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To much analysis!
Just ungrab the thoughts, sit Zazen as a Complete Action.
A bit like debating "do I smell that flower, how do I smell the flower, or do YOU smell the flower, is there an intention to smell the flower, is it nonjudgemental smelling, is there a conflict in smelling the flower ... ??"
Just smell the flower. This instant of smelling the flower is a Complete Action.
Gassho, JLast edited by Jundo; 01-09-2015, 05:30 PM.ALL OF LIFE IS OUR TEMPLEComment
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Thanks Jundo
Let me describe what happens in my mind. When I am asked to sit non-judgmentally, I sit with a feeling/knowing* of wholeness (whatever happens is okay; by the way judgments or not-accepting is okay too; all is buddha, all is one/whole) allowing (non-doing) everything to be as is. Then I get lost in a thought-chain. I wake up by myself. I continue to sit in that feeling/knowing of wholeness (This wholeness by the way existed even when I was lost). I get lost again. I come back. ad infinitum. May be I will have a judgment like "I am getting lost too much" but having that is okay too. Part of the whole. All one.
Is that correct? Is this what you describe? If so the waking up happens by itself, correct?. Is it just semantics? If what you are saying is different, then can you please make corrections to what I described above?
P.S. *when I say feeling, it is more like a knowing or acceptance or non-doing
Gassho,
Sam
Sat TodayComment
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Hello,
Thank you for the lesson.
Gassho,
Myosha sat today"Recognize suffering, remove suffering." - Shakyamuni Buddha when asked, "Uhm . . .what?"Comment
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Thank you all friends for your interesting teachings and reflections. I am not sure if I am right but according to my experience it´s more important to put the emphasis on the persistence than on the technique (beyond the basic technique, I mean). I know it´s hard to overcome the mind´s fear about doing these things in a right or a wrong way. The restless mind tries to be sure that we are sitting rightly, so we can get guarantee that the final result of our meditation will be good.
But combining Joko´s readings with I learnt reading their posts and my own reflections I have learnt that there are no guarantees of success. We do as best as possible and that´s all. The final result doesn´t depend on us. So after having learnt the basics of posture, breathing and mental attitude (and of course there are lots of things that we don´t master about it), I think the really important is to persist. By the way, master Shunryu Suzuki wrote something like the lost thoughts, I imagine after you are aware again and let them go, are like fertilizers for our mind field… so at least keep fertilizing our path!!
Gassho
Miguel
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Sit for a solid 40 minutes in the correct posture, then immediately re-write this post.Hi everyone,
The advice we’re often given in Zazen is to sit and to merely witness thoughts rising and falling. This evokes the image of thoughts being separate from us, almost like they’re occurring in a sort of cognitive slideshow that we’re witnessing. I really struggle with this as whenever my mind quietens sufficiently to be able to o this it feels trapped in another cognitive process….I hope that makes sense.
A little like an inability to experience any sort of separation from thinking whether its calm or not – there seems to be a constant presence or dialogue sometimes whispering in my ear.
Any thoughts (no pun intended honest)!
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