Dorothy Jones Lecture

   
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My Spot on the wall.

          I’ve returned from a weekend sesshin with my friends at “Deep Springs Temple”  (http://www.deepspringzen.org/)  near Pittsburgh PA. It’s was an intense experience. We had 4 ea. 40 minute sitting periods with a 10 minute kinhin (walking meditation) on Friday and Sunday and  4x5 ea. on Saturday. The zendo is a roughly 16’x30’ room with wood paneling. As is the practice in Soto Zen we sat facing the wall. By mid-day on Saturday my body hurt but my mind had started to clear, or so I thought.  I went to bed on Saturday night feeling all “zenny” and non-attached, knowing that I had made progress in my searchers life. The wakeup bell rang at 3:30 Sunday morning. After a quick trip to the bathroom I took my spot in the zendo, and looked for my little spot on the wall that had been my friend all day Saturday

          Then the realization hit me. “My” sitting spot and “My” spot on the wall. How these attachments grow in us, this clinging to anything in the material world. I had grow an attachment to a small hole in a piece of paneling. How appropriate is that since the hole is basically a void. I had become attached to the void.

          This reminded me of a short teaching that I had read. “When you have a muddy dirty pair of work jeans you need a good detergent to get them clean. But try as you might, the jeans are not really clean until you rinse out all of the detergent”.

          In the end we must not even be attached to the dharma. Freedom is what we are after. To save all sentient beings we must first be free ourselves.

Do your practice, be free,
Namaste’

Don

A few weeks ago Ann, a member of our sangha, made an off hand statement to me about how zazen has helped her. I asked her to expound briefly on this. Here is her letter back to me.

Don,

          This is just a short note to let you know how helpful the practice of zazen has been to me.  Since I started, just a little over 4 months ago, I have noticed a difference in my ability to focus.  My listening skills have improved. My memory and recall have sharpened.  I feel very fortunate to be reaping such benefits at this stage of my life.  As a nursing student I have studied the impact stress has on the human body, zen meditation is an excellent way to restore the mind and body.  I can not thank you enough for your generosity in teaching this art to me.

Namaste',

Ann Goas

Having just returned from a weekend sesshin at “Deep Spring Temple” near Pittsburgh I feel almost to a word as Ann does. The stresses of home and hearth can oft times weigh heavily on a person. In this information dominated age we are all so thoroughly inundated that our stress level are usually beyond the roof. Now I know some will say that they are off the grid but I venture to say that unless you try extremely hard you are never really off.

Health and mental health reasons are some on many things to take into consideration when beginning a practice. At the sesshin the teacher name was Dosho Port. One of the points he stresses with us was the quality of mercy. He, along with the resident priest Kyoki Roberts, continued on with this thought throughout the time I spend.

Many hands can lighten the load.

Sunday morning as we awoke at 3:30 a.m., everybody was trying to get ready for our sitting at 4:00 a.m. Kyoki had assumes the job as cook for the weekend. Now I can imagine that having an extra dozen or so folks is stressful. The participants in the sesshin do work sessions with assigned task. With a sink full of dishes and everybody running around, not one person thought of asking her if she need a hand.

(and the shoe drops)

During our morning Dharma talk Dosho again spoke of mercy at which point Kyoki, as a true Zen master would, brought our collective actions to our collective attentions. 

She explained it thusly, and I paraphrase, When you walk into a room look around be a part of what is happening. If you see something needs done do it. When you leave, leave no trace behind.

That, my friends, will stick with me for quite a while. To live life as such. Seeing something need done and doing it leaving with no trace, no ego, no attachment. If we use less of our ego and more of our mind, imagine how our stress levels would plummet. If we had mercy on ourselves and others maybe we wouldn’t need to be a “Prozac” nation.

Ann, your journey has just begun with zazen. You have many more rewards to reap from this practice. The effort that you have put into your practice will benefit you from now until you pass from this life.

Be merciful to yourself, for we cannot be merciful to others until we can show mercy to ourselves. Be merciful to others, walk into the room of their life, see if anything needs done, do it, and leave with no trace, no bad karma.

Be diligent in your practice, whatever that may look like. Do it to the best of you ability.

Namaste’,

Don