A matter of practice ....daily rhythm

[Frank]

Do you have a certain rhythm/order to your practice?

For a few weeks, mine has kind of gone like this:

Awake, breakfast, wife off to work.
First sit.
Shower, housework, lunch.
Second sit.
Listen to some light music, reading/study, tea.
Prepare dinner.
Wife home, talk about her day (she's a hospice nurse so she needs to vent, unwind distress. Yesterday for example she had a death while on a home visit...needed to vent)
Dinner together, little TV, light reading.
Dishes.
Third sit
Bedtime.

How does your day roll?

Gassho
Frank
Sat Today

[Myosha]

Hello,

Eat when hungry, sleep when tired.


Gassho
Myosha sat today

[Eishuu]

Hi Frank,
I've only been doing zazen daily for a month or so but I tend to sit for 15 mins on waking and do a short sit with my husband before bed, which is really nice as in 5 years he's never meditated with me before. And then as I'm housebound and not working I may or may not have extra sits in the day depending on how I feel. Some days I am drawn to have lots of short sits. I am finding zazen quite addictive, if that's the word. I've been meditating for some 20 years but have often experienced a lot of resistance to it and struggled to sit regularly. In contrast I find myself gravitating to zazen, almost falling into it.

Gassho
Lucy
Sat today

[Frank]

Thanks Mosho, Thanks Lucy...

[Kyonin]

Hi Frank.

My days follow this pattern almost always. Sometimes I do sleep a while longer

I get up at 4:30 AM

Make a cup of coffee.

Drink coffee while I read.

Chant Hart Sutra.

Zazen for 40 minutes.

Verse of Atonement and Four Vows.

Yoga (1 hour)

Then it's work, cooking and lunch.

In the afternoon it's a little more work.

Zazen for 20 minutes or more.

And that's pretty much it.

Gassho,

Kyonin
#SatToday

[Mp]

Hey Frank,

When I wake, I move like a feather in the wind ... life sometimes has it's own rhythm. A branch that is too stiff breaks in the wind. =)

Gassho
Shingen

#sattoday

[Frank]

Thank you Kyonin..Thank you Shingen

[Jishin]

Hello,

Eat when hungry, sleep when tired.


Gassho
Myosha sat today

Fart when gassy.

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

[Joyo]

"Having no destination, I am never lost" --Ikkyu

Gassho,
Joyo
sat today

[Jundo]

Hey Frank,

When I wake, I move like a feather in the wind ... life sometimes has it's own rhythm. A branch that is too stiff breaks in the wind. =)

Gassho
Shingen

#sattoday

Resonates here.

When I am in a monastery sitting Sesshin, I might live a very scheduled life ... up at 3:30, Zazen at 4, Ceremony at 6, Oryoki Breakfast at 7 ... back to bed at 9 at night ... day after day, repeat repeat.

Also, everyone is different. Some folks do well with a firm rhythm, others float like the feather.

Perhaps it is my personality, some of it is my work as a translator (the assignments and deadlines always vary) or other responsibilities, but no two days are quite the same. I am rarely to bed or up from bed at the same time twice. I sit Zazen daily, usually before coffee (unless life emergencies delay), read a couple of pages of the old Suttas or Sutras ... and then I am off, taking it as it comes ... very irregular, never the same. Some things I do manage to accomplish every day ... translation work, a bit of Japanese study, an hour on the exercise bike, more Buddhist reading, shopping, picking the kids up from school, dinner with the family and (of course) Treeleaf ... but no fixed schedule, lengths or even order of happening. Even my Zazen periods are rarely the same length, depending on my heart that day. Once twice more, 10 minutes or 40 minutes ...

I am consistent and get er' done ... just not on the schedule.

Everyone is different, with their own personality. Neither way is better or worse for this I feel. That is why I do not recommend everyone to do as I do, and some folks may benefit more from Frank and Kyonin's order.

Gassho, J

SatToday (about 11:07 for 20 minutes I think)

[Mp]

I am consistent and get er' done ... just not on the schedule.

So true ... and of course when I want to be that feather and just float along, life needs me to be structured and scheduled, so then I be structured and scheduled. Even when I float like a feather, I too have daily routine and practices that I do ... I have just found for me is to be flexible with those structures and schedules. Like Jundo said, we each have our own groove that we groove too. =)

Gassho
Shingen

#sattoday

[Geika]

Thank you, everyone,

I think one of my biggest preoccupations in Practice is how to structure my life in a way that looks like I expect Zen Practice to be, but this is just a distraction from what really is my life as a Zen practitioner. Zen is unexcluded from the moments when I feel I am failing. That feeling of failing is just me grasping, experiencing the dukkha that arises when I have some sort of idea of what should be instead of what is, separating everything.

Gassho, sat today

[Kyotai]

Hello Frank,

My schedule is a little more all over the map. But on a day like today,

Up at 4am, breakfast, make lunch, shower and 10 minutes Zazen. Off to work for 0600. Home at 1500 hrs. Sit Zazen for 20 minutes, make supper, clean, pick up kids, dinner, playtime, swimming skating or scouts for kids, bed time and repeat all over again.

Gassho, Kyotai
Sat today

[Kakunen]

A matter of practice ....daily rhythm

We will walk kinhin step by step.
We will sit Zazen breath by breath.

So we do not need to think about rhythm.Rhythm need 2step and more.

But before when we walk one step,we can not realize 2nd step.

Rhythm is a word that express from outside and result of our steps.

In heart sutra express about emptiness and nothingness. We do not have form.


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[Kakunen]

Schedule of Antaiji.

http://antaiji.org/en/practice/schedule/

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