April 4th-5th, 2014 - OUR MONTHLY 4-hour ZAZENKAI!

[Jundo]

NOTE: VIDEO PART I UP THRU FIRST KINHIN, PART II THEREFROM

THE READING [from David Loy] FOR THE TALK IS BELOW IN THIS THREAD.

Dear All,

Please 'sit-a-long' with our MONTHLY 4-hour ZAZENKAI, netcast LIVE 8am to noon Japan time Saturday morning (that is New York 7pm to 11pm, Los Angeles 4pm to 8pm (Friday night), London midnight to 4am and Paris 1am to 5am (early Saturday morning)) ...

... to be visible at the following link during those times and any time thereafter ...

LIVE ZAZENKAI NETCAST at GOOGLE+ IS HERE:
CLICK ON THE TAB ON LOWER RIGHT FOR 'FULL SCREEN

http://youtu.be/DulOI2nYEIo

PART II

http://youtu.be/Rrj1SiCpGuw

FOR THOSE NOT ALREADY MEMBERS OF THE CIRCLE WHO WISH TO JOIN TO SIT LIVE WITH A CAMERA, INSTRUCTIONS are posted AT THIS LINK. WE ARE NOW LIMITED TO 10 INDIVIDUALS WITH CAMERAS, BUT ANY NUMBER CAN WATCH LIVE 'ONE WAY' AND SIT-A-LONG VIA THE ABOVE SCREEN. IF JOINING WITH CAMERA, PLEASE MAKE SURE YOUR MICROPHONE IS MUTED:

The Sitting Schedule is as follows;

00:00 - 00:50 CEREMONY (HEART SUTRA / SANDOKAI IN ENGLISH) & ZAZEN
00:50 - 01:00 KINHIN
01:00 - 01:30 ZAZEN
01:30 - 01:50 KINHIN

01:50 - 02:30 DHARMA TALK & ZAZEN
02:30 - 02:40 KINHIN

02:40 - 03:15 ZAZEN
03:15 - 03:30 KINHIN
03:30 - 04:00 METTA CHANT & ZAZEN, VERSE OF ATONEMENT, FOUR VOWS, & CLOSING


Our Zazenkai consists of our chanting the 'Heart Sutra' and the 'Identity of Relative and Absolute (Sandokai)' in English (please download our Chant Book at the link below), some full floor prostrations (please follow along with me ... or a simple Gassho can be substituted if you wish), a little talk by me ... and we close with the 'Metta Chant', followed at the end with the 'Verse of Atonement' and 'The Four Vows'. Oh, and lots and lots of Zazen and walkin' Kinhin in between!

Please download and print out the Chants we will recite at the following link (PDF):

Chant Book (PDF)

or

Chant Book (SHORT VERSION HTML)

I STRONGLY SUGGEST THAT YOU POSITION YOUR ZAFU ON THE FLOOR IN A PLACE WHERE YOU ARE NOT STARING DIRECTLY AT THE COMPUTER SCREEN, BUT CAN GLANCE OVER AND SEE THE SCREEN WHEN NECESSARY. YOUR ZAFU SHOULD ALSO BE IN A POSITION WHERE YOU CAN SEE THE COMPUTER SCREEN WHILE STANDING IN FRONT OF THE ZAFU FOR THE CEREMONIES, AND HAVE ROOM FOR BOWING AND KINHIN.

ALSO, REMEMBER TO SET YOUR COMPUTER (& SCREEN SAVER) SO THAT IT DOES NOT SHUT OFF DURING THE 4 HOURS.

I hope you will join us ... an open Zafu is waiting. When we drop all thought of 'here' 'there' 'now' 'then' ... we are sitting all together!


Gassho, Jundo

[Mp]

Wonderful Jundo ... I look forward to sitting. =)

Gassho
Shingen

[Kyonin]

I'll be there

Gassho,

Kyonin

[Dosho]

I'll be here.

Gassho,
Dosho

[Sydney]

I'm in. Thanks

[Juki]

I will be there.

Gassho,
Juki

[Koshin]

Same here

Gassho

[Shinzan]

I'll be there, at least for part of the time.
Shinzan

[Jundo]

OUR READING FOR TODAY'S ZAZENKAI:

I was thinking of basing today's talk on some "Zen classic" from 800 or 1000 years ago. But I believe that certain books by living, modern Buddhist authors might someday be seen as "living classics" which are bringing our old Teachings up to date for modern times. I recently recommended David Loy's "Money Sex War Karma: Notes For A Buddhist Revolution" as such a book ...

http://www.treeleaf.org/forums/showthread.php?12106-TWO-BOOK-RECOMMENDATIONS-from-JUNDO-Money-Sex-War-Karma-Living-Zen

... and will use some passages from it as the basis for today's talk.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
[From Pages 19-23]

[I have a] feeling that there is something missing or lacking in my life. What is
it that’s lacking? How I understand that depends upon the kind of
person I am and the kind of society I live in. The sense that something
is wrong with me is too vague, too amorphous. It needs to be given
more specific form if I’m to be able to do something about it, and
that form usually depends upon how I’ve been raised. In modern
developed (or “economized”) societies such as the United States, I
am likely to understand my lack as not having enough money—
regardless of how much money I already have. Money is important
to us not only because we can buy anything with it, but also because
it has become a kind of collective reality symbol. The more money
you get, the more real you become! That’s the way we tend to think,
anyway.(When a wealthy person arrives somewhere his or her presence
is acknowledged much more than the arrival of a “nobody.”)
Because money doesn’t really end dukkha—it can’t fill up the bottomless
hole at one’s core—this way of thinking often becomes a
trap.You’re a multi-millionaire but still feel like something is wrong
with your life? Obviously you don’t have enough money yet.

Another example is fame. ... If you think that fame is what will make you real,
you can never be famous enough.The same is true of power. ...
…

Fundamentally, Buddhism is about awakening,
which means realizing something about the constructedness
of the sense of self and the nothing at its core. … Usually
that void at our core is so uncomfortable that we try to evade it, by
identifying with something else that might give us stability and security.
Another way to say it is that we keep trying to fill up that hole,
yet it’s a bottomless pit. Nothing that we can ever grasp or achieve
can end our sense of lack.

So what happens when we don’t run away from that hole at our
core? That’s what we’re doing when we meditate: we are “letting
go” of all the physical and mental activity that distracts us from our
emptiness. Instead,we just sit with it and as it. It’s not that easy to do,
because the hole gives us such a feeling of insecurity, ungroundedness,
unreality. Meditation is uncomfortable, especially at the beginning,
because in our daily lives we are used to taking evasive action.
So we tend to take evasive action when we meditate too: we fantasize,
make plans, feel sorry for ourselves…

But if I can learn to not run away, to stay with those uncomfortable
feelings, to become friendly with them, then something can
happen to that core—and to me, insofar as that hole is what “I” really
am.The curious thing about my emptiness is that it is not really a
problem.The problem is that we think it’s a problem. Our ways of
trying to escape it make it into a problem.

Some Buddhist sutras talk about paravritti, a “turning around” that
transforms the festering hole at my core into a life-healing flow which
springs up spontaneously from I-know-not-where. Instead of being
experienced as a sense of lack, the empty core becomes a place where
there is now awareness of something other than, more than,my usual
sense of self. I can never grasp that “more than,” I can never understand
what it is—and I do not need to, because “I” am an expression
of it. My role is to become a better manifestation of it, with less interference
from the delusion of ego-self. So our emptiness has two sides:
the negative, problematic aspect is a sense of lack.The other aspect is
being in touch with, and manifesting, something greater than my
sense of self—that is, something more than I usually understand
myself to be.The original Buddhist term usually translated as emptiness
(Pali shunnata; Sanskrit shunyata) … [but] a more accurate translation of
shunyata would be: emptiness/fullness,which describes quite well the
experience of our own empty core,both the problem and the solution.

… The point isn’t to get rid of the self: that’s not possible, for there
never has been a self. Nor do we want
to get rid of the sense of self: that would be a rather unpleasant type
of mental retardation. Rather, what we work toward is a more permeable,
less dualistic sense of self, which is more aware of, and more
comfortable with, its empty constructedness.

http://www.wisdompubs.org/sites/default/files/preview/Money,%20Sex,%20War,%20Karma%20Book%20Preview.pdf

[Joyo]

With the time change it will be harder for me to be there. I will try to make it to the end part.

Gassho,
Joyo

[Myosha]

Participating.


Gassho,
Myosha

[Sekishi]

I will not be home in time for the start time this week. Will either join in live later or sit offline. Deep bows to all who sit.
-Sekishi

[Ishin]

Sit with you all in zen time, Sunday AM Clark Time.
Gassho
C

[Daitetsu]

Will try to be there for the first 1.5 hours or so.
If not, will sit with recording at the weekend.

I have heard/read a lot of great stuff from David Loy in the last six months...
May I use the opportunity to - once again - recommend the talk he held at last year's Buddhist Geeks conference? Truly fantastic if you have the chance to watch it.

Gassho,

Daitetsu

[Joyo]

I can't get in, anyone else have the same issue?

Gassho,
Joyo