New Zen Podcast from Soto Teacher Domyo Burk

[Tom]

thanks Hoko, will listen today.
Gassho, Tom
About to sit.

[Diarmuid1]

It's a great podcast and she also wrote a great book, An Idiot's Guide to Zen Living which is available for a steal on Amazon.

[Ryumon]

It's a good podcast, but if you prefer reading, the full texts of what she says on the podcast are on the website. (She essentially just reads these articles on the podcast.) That can also be an easy way to refer back to them if you want.

Gassho,

Kirk

[Banto]

Thank you for this recommendation, I've been listening now to her podcasts (10 now I believe) and they are all so very clear and easy to follow. Enough so that I thought it'd be good to share with my mom who is interested in learning more, and she too found Domyo Burk very accessible. I ordered the Zen Living book from her and it looks very comprehensive for beginners (all).

Also appreciate Jundo's reminder and emphasis on the completeness and wholeness of sitting as sitting. To the marrow. That teaching has been so very pivotal for me
Much gratitude
Gassho
SatToday

[Banto]

Well after reading a handful of chapters from Domyo Burk's Idiots Guide to Zen Living, I came across a bit that is different.

She describes 2 aspects to "Zen Meditation", that being calm abiding and insight. Chapter 8 describes a Samatha aspect of settling the mind and a Vipassana aspect of inquiry in to (life challenges?) and the latter is to be performed after the mind has settled. Theravada Zen?

I still very much enjoy and appreciate the podcasts and wonderfully presented material, but good to keep in mind this a bit different from our practice

Anyways just FYI, interesting ...

SatToday

[Kyousui]

Well after reading a handful of chapters from Domyo Burk's Idiots Guide to Zen Living

While I think her zen studies podcast site is wonderful, I refuse to read any books for Idiots . I suppose my aversion keeps me from learning. Good thing I have all eternity to get over it.

[Jundo]

Well after reading a handful of chapters from Domyo Burk's Idiots Guide to Zen Living, I came across a bit that is different.

She describes 2 aspects to "Zen Meditation", that being calm abiding and insight. Chapter 8 describes a Samatha aspect of settling the mind and a Vipassana aspect of inquiry in to (life challenges?) and the latter is to be performed after the mind has settled. Theravada Zen?

I still very much enjoy and appreciate the podcasts and wonderfully presented material, but good to keep in mind this a bit different from our practice

Hi Banto,

I have not read Domyo's book so I do not know exactly what she is proposing (Actually, I just found it, see my next post). However, it might be argued that even Shikantaza contains Samatha and Vipassana aspects. An old post:

Buddhist Practice is usually described as flying upon the twin wings of Samatha (calming thoughts and emotions, illuminating and dropping body-mind) and awareness and understanding of vipassana (insight and awareness primarily into the nature and workings of 'self' and mental functions). That is true in Zen practice no less than most other forms of Buddhist practice.

In a nutshell, Vipassana might be described as insights and awareness, based on Buddhist psychology, as to how the mind works and plays it games. It is an understanding of the Skandhas (form, sensation, perception, mental formation, consciousness ... those words always sung in the Heart Sutra), how our thoughts and emotional reactions arise, how we label and divide the world. We should also understand the Buddha's ideas about how suffering arises within us, which is intimately tied to all that.

However, unlike some schools of Buddhism, in Shikantaza we do not pursue any particular practices --during-- Zazen itself in order to cultivate such vipassana insight ... and much insight naturally arises from Zazen as "Zazen does its thing". Perhaps we might say that, just in "just sitting" Shikantaza ... dropping thoughts of this and that, thus quieting the mind's "mind games" ... we develop a natural sensitivity and understanding of the mind's "mind games" (much like one first comes to really appreciate what "urban noise" is when one first drives out of the city to the middle of the desert or some other truly quiet place).

Off the cushion too, we can learn to bring Shikantaza out into the world, learning to release thoughts and emotions which arise without being trapped by them.

And, apart from "on the Zafu" sitting times, it is also good to develop some insight and insight into the "mind's games", and come to identify the workings of the Skandhas and such within us day to day.

For example, if you feel an angry or jealous thought arising within you during your day, it is very helpful to identify that as a "bit of temporary mind theatre" and "just the self judging and conflicting with another perceived self". That gives us some distance from the passing emotion, and we no longer see the emotion as quite as inevitable and "true" as we might have before.

For example, in the case of anger ... We need to develop a sensitivity to how anger arises within us, the triggers which tend to set it off, the first feeling of it starting to arise and the cycle it follows until vanishing. We need to catch ourself more and develop the ability to say, "I am feeling the emotion of anger now, but it is only the mind created theater which is present in this moment ... it need not be so." We need to see it as a story the self writes for itself, "catch it" and thus not be "sucked in" and fooled as much. (Most people who feel anger do not realize it is just a mind created bit of theater which can be replaced by something else ... it is not the way things "have to be". E.g., most people think, when they become upset, that they have "reason to be upset, and it is true and justified", not an optional response to the circumstances). That realization and understanding of how our inner theater works is a step to developing the ability to "rewrite and change the story" at will.

So, yes, "samatha/vipassana" are both important.

I will say too that many times I have had the experience (I am sure you have as well) of heading for the cushion with a life problem or important life decision weighing on me. I am not actively thinking about the problem on the cushion, but neither am I unaware of it. It is present and we might say that we "non-think" it ... that it is "on our minds", but just becomes illuminated. Somehow, in the stillness of sitting, the problem dissolves or the decision becomes simpler somehow. (That does not mean that the result I choose will necessarily be "the right decision", but simply that the quiet and clarity of sitting allows the heart more easily to be heard and make a choice).

Again, here is a practice called Nurturing Seeds, related to all this and inspired by some of the writings of Thich Nhat Hahn, which we encourage around here.

http://www.treeleaf.org/forums/showthread.php?6540-RECOMMENDED-DAILY-Nurturing-Seeds-PRACTICE

Gassho, J

Sat Today!

[Jundo]

I think I found that section of Domyo's book ...

https://books.google.co.jp/books?id=7bA7AgAAQBAJ&q=vipassana#v=snippet&q=vipassana&f=false

She does not seem to be describing "Samatha" as some deep, highly concentrated state, but as the open awareness of Shikantaza.

However, yes, her discussion of Vipassana seems to talk about intentionally introducing a "teaching" or "asking a question" about it and contemplating the question during Zazen. No, I can't go for that. I can't say that I absolutely don't do it sometimes too once in awhile (see my point on making "hard decisions" above), but it is not Shikantaza or our usual way.

She is from Jiyu Kennett's Lineage through Gyokuko Carlson, and sometimes they have their own interpretation on things.

Gassho, J

SatToday

[Banto]

Thanks Jundo

Yes that's the part, the "Focusing on a Question" section. "Generally speaking, you want to focus on a question in vipassana zazen. If you contemplate a teaching, ask a question about it and contemplate the question." "you ask additional questions to gently push the inquiry toward insight." "Vipassana isn't a simple process of sitting down to figure out an answer in one meditation session. It's a long process of diligently getting to know your subject inside and out. Eventually you may happen upon the pivotal question that unlocks the whole puzzle."

It's the intentional long term pursuit of answers to inner questions during sitting that threw me off, and really the suggestion that there's more work to do, specific action.

For me, it's a risky business and I'll be right back to thinking I'm missing some aspect of "growth", chasing and pursuing. Out of round. Discontent.
Although being aware of that very tendency of mine has underscored my "in the marrow" confidence in the wholeness and completeness of Shikantaza, so insights are indeed revealed but not by pursuing the answers, at least for me. If that makes sense. And this is why I appreciate the teaching and emphasis here so so much!

Off the cushion perhaps I'll observe my reactions and perhaps peel apart the onion a bit, as in your point on hard decisions, yes indeed.

The rest of the book has been quite delightful, very approachable. I've had family members ask about a comprehensive intro book to Zen and other than Opening the Hand of Thought, I've only had fragments/chapters of books that I thought were helpful. Actually I end up pointing them to Treeleaf including the videos. This Domyo book looks like a potential recommendation, but the red flag came up in that chapter 8. Her podcasts haven't hit on vipassana yet so we'll see what comes from future ones. I have sure enjoyed the recordings so far, usually on my commute

Gassho!
Banto/Rodney/EasterBunny
SatToday