Thoughts and not thoughts…

[Ishin]

Thank you, Lisa, for the quote from Master Ejo's Komyozo ...



Yes.

Is Shikantaza "about thoughts"? Is Shikantaza "not about thoughts"? I don't know or care. I simply sit, not grabbing onto thoughts nor chasing them away, "paying no never mind". A light of clarity then shines through both thoughts or silence, the mirror holds all of life in wholeness without resistance.

This "Just Sitting" is anything but "sitting doing nothing", because one realizes this "in the doing, no thing that is each and every thing". It is not "whatever happens is fine" because, sitting in the radical allowing of "no need to change things, all just what it is", the delusions drop away and thus ignorance changes to Wisdom. Everything changes. All Is Just What It Is, which ain't what it seemed before.

Gassho, J

SatToday!

This is brilliant in it's simplicity.
Deep Bows

Gassho

C/Ishin
Sat Today!

[dharmasponge]

Hopefully Willow.

Jishin, I too am a practicing psychological therapist - CBT and Solution Focused Therapy. Maybe that has something to do with me at once being seduced and infuriated by Dogen/Shikantaza

Sat Today

[michaeljc]

Barry Magid wrote:
Joko [Beck] used to say that it takes people many, many years to find out what practice really is, and when they get to that point, most of them quit, because that’s when they really find out that it’s not about fulfilling my curative fantasy but of really giving up that fantasy. That’s the point where most people go across town to the some other guru in order to revive the pursuit of whatever kind of permanent inner state that they’re trying to create for themselves. So for Joko, there was always this sense that we’re not so much cultivating a particular state, as constantly subtracting, constantly moving away from the desire to claim control or hold on to any particular thing, including any inner states.

Zen acknowledges the ordinary, every-day. Shikantaza observes it. Zazen creates a new appreciation of it.

That is all.

As I see it right now

m

Sat 2-day

[dharmasponge]

Please understand that I am just trying hard to establish that what I am doing is Shikantaza and NOT sitting on my arse facing a wall…I think I know the difference J

…by ‘Just Sitting’ are we aware that we’re just sitting or is that going too far.

I sat this morning and I became aware of the process of sitting in a way that felt like everything was happening arouond me – there was a sort of calm amidst the storm of the birds tweeting and the leaves in the tress – in fact the more noise the better it seemed. I heard the boiler come on and that made that inner calm more palpable. I felt body awareness fall away and just sat in that wider peripheral inner space………

….Zoning out or Shikantaza?

Sat Today

[michaeljc]

NOTHING is superfluous. This is a realisation that can only come through Zazen (according to my experience) Trust in Zazen. Let it do its job.

Frustration can be a useful part of Zazen

Cheers

m

Sat 2-day

Edit: Why not just sit on your arse and face the wall? "I'm a fuck-wit" "I don't know what I am doing" are wonderful attitudes on which to sit.

[dharmasponge]

"I'm a fuck-wit" "I don't know what I am doing"

Yup! Every time I sit in Zazen...

[michaeljc]

dharma - According to my observation there is no consensus on what constitutes Shikantaza. Some try to define it, many don't. If it should mean 'following the moment' we can get a taste of this by 'just listen'. This is not easy to sustain. I am still not convinced that it is a method, but rather a product of Zazen. I don't think that we need to concern ourselves over this. Given a chance Zazen takes us to where it want's to go, not where we may wish or expect. This is the wonderful thing about this practice. It is an adventure.

As I see it right now

m

Just sat

[dharmasponge]

Maybe it's trust and faith that I need?

[Kokuu]

Maybe it's trust and faith that I need?

Trust and faith may well be worth a go, Tony. Instead of analysing your sitting, just trust you are doing fine and let go of worrying about it. Have faith that Dogen, Nishijima, Jundo and many more Zen folk know what they are talking about when it comes to sitting.

Shikantaza is more like a wander in the woods than following a map but you won't get lost - you are always right where you need to be.

I would guess your professional training has taught you to analyse and you are probably very good at that. Now it might be time to see if you can let go of that for a little while!

Gassho
Kokuu
#sattoday

[dharmasponge]

I like that Kokuu thanks....

[shikantazen]

I sat the below way for a few months and really liked it. "Simply sitting, non-doing, allowing everything; "whatever happens is ok" kind of attitude. I don't explicitly have a goal to keep waking up from thoughts but when it happens it is fine. The only rule is this: I don't sit there and purposefully try to think about something. Other than that understanding, I have nothing else to do with thoughts (or waking up from them). Yet despite this, in practice I found I was waking up from thought quite a number of times"

I don't like (for lack of a better word) adding a rule that we need to keep waking up from thought. Just to clarify, I do wake up from thought (by myself) when I simply sit too; quite frequently in fact. I just don’t like it as an explicit rule or it being part of the instruction for Zazen. That one instruction kills the entire beauty of shikantaza for me. If I have to strictly follow a technique/method (like waking up from thought), my mind is only busy doing that and it becomes like any other regular method ("opening the hand of thought" method or breath following). The "sitting as wholeness" will then become just a conceptual overlay; I am anyway sitting in wholeness, of what use is it to make it explicit? Why is that even needed? Why not simply wake up from thoughts as described in "Opening the hand of thought"? Or keep returning using an object (breath/sounds/palm)?

Gassho,
Sam
Sat Today

[michaeljc]

Sam - that is pretty much my approach too. As my (40 m) sits progress things slow down of their own accord. Often I find myself following breath quiet naturally. I have never felt the need to force this. Nevertheless, I don't discount the more proactive approaches of relentlessly refocusing on a point/subject such as a koan. Breath practice, be it so simple, definitely has real promise too. Whatever, I feel that the 'just sit' approach is most appropriate for beginners. Many of us may not need do anything else.

I do have a few personal tricks I play on occasions involving enforced focus. One is a koan. I don't need to delve too deep before I break into shudders. Sitting light eliminates this.

Courses for horses IMO

Cheers

m

Will sit tonight

[dharmasponge]

Thanks both...but neither sounds like Jundos descriptions of Shikantaza. Particularly breath practice (Anapanasati?).

[michaeljc]

but neither sounds like Jundos descriptions of Shikantaza

I am sure that it isn't

I have never claimed to practice Shikantaza -or any other method. I practice Zazen.

m

Sat 2-day

[dharmasponge]

I am sure that it isn't

I have never claimed to practice Shikantaza -or any other method. I practice Zazen.

m

Sat 2-day

Alrighty...now I am more confused - Zazen not synonymous with Shikantaza? I know Koan/Huatou are specifically different but I wasn't aware that Treeleaf had different Zazen practices.