For many springs
I’ve come here to meet
And unite my mind
With the opening blossoms, so
I’m made of many recollections.
- Saigyo (1118-1190)
I'm agnostic to belief systems. I want to know if the inquiry is open and active.
Being in tremendous turmoil, the unoriented do not know that their own mind is Buddha. They search about, outside of themselves, spending the whole day contemplating the Buddha and paying homage. But where is the Buddha? Do not entertain any such false views. Awaken to your own mind: outside the mind there can be no Buddha.
- Bodhidharma
...say it.
Nowhere is there placeThe General and the Ambassador regale Congress with Arabian stories that are not good enough to placate worries. The champagne has been pushed to the back of the fridge.
To stop and live, so only
Everywhere will do:
Each and every grass-made hut soon leaves
Its place within this withering world.
- Saigyo (1118-1190)
It is frightening to witness this hate-torn world suddenly united for one brief hour, against Jesus. And what does he do? Every trial is in reality a struggle -- but not this one. Jesus refuses to fight. He proves nothing. He denies nothing. He attacks nothing. Instead he stands by and lets events run their course -- more, at the proper moment, he says precisely what is necessary for his conviction. His words and attitude have nothing to do with the logic or demands of a defence. Their source lies elsewhere. The accused makes no attempt to hinder whatever is to come; but his silence is neither that of weakness nor of desperation. It is divine reality; full, holy consciousness of the approaching "hour"; perfect readiness. His silence brings into being what is to be.
(--Romano Guardini, in Jesus Christ, Meditations, c.1959)
The silence of the American people allows the two messengers to reprise and resound their winning tales to investors in the war. The dividends are trickling out into the halls where once honest brokers did not try to parse democracy and decency.Transcending Everyday ConsciousnessEntirely different realities would fit about now.
When we sit down to meditate, we are trying to transcend our everyday consciousness: the one with which we transact our ordinary business, the one used in the worlds market-place as we go shopping, bring up our children, work in an office or in our business, clean the house, check our bank statements, and all the rest of daily living. That kind of consciousness is known to everyone and without it we can't function. It is our survival consciousness and we need it for that. It cannot reach far enough or deep enough into the Buddha's teachings, because these are unique and profound; our everyday consciousness is neither unique or profound, it's just utilitarian. In order to attain the kind of consciousness that is capable of going deeply enough into the teachings to make them our own and thereby change our whole inner view, we need a mind with the ability to remove itself from the ordinary thinking process. That is only possible through meditation. There is no other way. Meditation is therefore a means and not an end in itself. It is a means to change the mind's capacity in such a way that we can see entirely different realities from the ones we are used to.
(- Ayya Khema, from When the Iron Eagle Flies, from Everyday Mind, a Tricycle book edited by Jean Smith)
If you break openThen I think about surrender. I think about the hard acceptance that precedes freedom, a freedom even in prison, or in the shadow of an ego no longer completely in charge.
The cherry tree,
There is not a single flower.
But the skies of spring
Bring forth the blossoms!
- Ikkyu (1394-1481)
Eckhart Tolle with Oprah said one could be whole without being perfect. I like that.
At center, God. No need to go anywhere. Except perhaps to drop through illusory self into true center. Whether nature, humankind, acts, thoughts, feelings, or noise. We fall into silence.In Pali, heart and mind are one word (citta), but in English we have to differentiate between the two to make the meaning clear. When we attend to the mind, we are concerned with the thinking process and the intellectual understanding that derives from knowledge, and with our ability to retain knowledge and make use of it. When we speak of heart we think of feelings and emotions, our ability to respond with our fundamental being. Although we may believe that we are leading our lives according to our thinking process, that is not the case. If we examine this more closely, we will find that we are leading our lives according to our feelings and that our thinking is dependent upon our feelings. The emotional aspect of ourselves is of such great importance that its purification is the basis for a harmonious and peaceful life, and also for good meditation.I write to a man in jail pending court date on charges of child sexual abuse.
- Ayya Khema, When the Iron Eagle Flies
from Everyday Mind, a Tricycle book edited by Jean Smith
I write you just to write you. I’m pretty sure your situation sucks. You’ve probably come up against the strong and violent dislike on the part of both inmates and guards for the category of person who wears the charges you’ve got on your name. It’s a hard fact that many feel that vengeance and punishment are a sworn duty to be carried out even by some whose own situations are barely different than yours. But you know this already.Child sexual abuse is a frightening crime. So many suffer. So little rehabilitation.
I write to tell you that you’ve found yourself a rough spiritual path. But a spiritual path it is. These words might sound silly, and I apologize if they are impertinent to you -- but, nevertheless, this is where you are for now. And, as you know, there is only now. You’ve come to a point in your life where you might not want to be, but there you are. We all are.
We Bring Democracy To The FishI must rehabilitate my heart/mind.
It is unacceptable that fish prey on each other.
For their comfort and safety, we will liberate them
into fishfarms with secure, durable boundaries
that exclude predators. Our care will provide
for their liberty, health, happiness, and nutrition.
Of course all creatures need to feel useful.
At maturity the fish will discover their purposes.
Poem: "We Bring Democracy To The Fish" by Donald Hall, from White Apples and the Taste of Stone. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2007.
What is the hearth of the heart if not the good earth: the soil, the life-blood of rivers, the throbbing life-force in the intimate depths of every green thing, every flowering form, every singing, winging bird? And what is the heart if not this resonance, this inner knowing through which we love and, in turn, know anew and love again? We breathe in and we inhale the exhalation of forests, plankton, desert sage and the fragrance of spreading spring violets. We breathe out and the trees inhale us, take us into themselves in this grand conspiracy of life, this godly inspiration, this earthly distillation, this human intersection of all that is.
(--Return to Earth, in Earthlines, By Diane Pendola, http://www.ecocontemplative.org/elspring08.html)
I'd be willing to be taken in.
It often escapes me when exactly it happened that Americans began fearing their leaders and hating their country.
Sentient beings are really Buddha.In Buddhist group a bowl of donuts, m&m's, chips, and cookies to celebrate H's release next week. Time magazine has the Dalai Lama on cover.
Like water and ice;
Apart from water, no ice;
Outside of sentient beings, no Buddha.
Not knowing it is near
They seek for it afar!
Just like being in water,
But crying for thirst!
- Hakuin
I rejoiced when the Lord listened
to the voice of my pleading;
I rejoiced for he turned his ear to me,
as I called to him day after day.
The ropes of death were around me,
the agonies of the underworld were upon me.
I came upon trouble and anguish,
and I called on the name of the Lord:
“Lord, free my soul”.
The Lord is kind and just,
our God takes pity on us.
The Lord guards the weak;
I am cast down, but he will save me.
Turn, my soul, to your rest,
for the Lord is kind to you.
He has torn my soul away from death,
my eyes from tears,
my feet from falling.
I shall walk before the Lord in the land of the living.
--Psalm 114 (116A)
In Protective Custody a new drop-in to the table is making sure we understand what he understands about Romans. We tell him it's meant to be a conversation, no matter how good the words he persistently reads at us. We get into a little Marcos Borg and Dominic Crosson. I see a man I used to see in seg. He's walking wide circles around the pod. I greet him. He wondered why I stopped visiting him. I was only a temporary chaplain, I'm a volunteer now, I say. He figured I'd catch him up.
April 4, 2008Robert the Trappist monk said again this year: "Cheer up! Things are going to get worse."
81% in Poll Say Nation Is Headed on the Wrong Track
By DAVID LEONHARDT and MARJORIE CONNELLY
Americans are more dissatisfied with the country’s direction than at any time since the New York Times/CBS News poll began asking about the subject in the early 1990s, according to the latest poll.
In the poll, 81 percent of respondents said they believed “things have pretty seriously gotten off on the wrong track,” up from 69 percent a year ago and 35 percent in early 2002.
Although the public mood has been darkening since the early days of the war in Iraq, it has taken a new turn for the worse in the last few months, as the economy has seemed to slip into recession. There is now nearly a national consensus that the country faces significant problems.
A majority of nearly every demographic and political group — Democrats and Republicans, men and women, residents of cities and rural areas, college graduates and those who finished only high school — say the United States is headed in the wrong direction. Seventy-eight percent of respondents said the country was worse off than five years ago; just 4 percent said it was better off.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/04/us/04poll.html?_r=1&hp=&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print
No doubt.
If people are quiet,I'll try to make light of it -- my foolishness.
They can be quiet anywhere.
If people aren’t quiet
They won’t be quiet in the mountains.
Everything depends on you.
Life is transient,
Like a flash of lightning in a dream.
Before we receive this form,
We had another face,
Our original face.
We can’t see it with our eyes.
We can only know it with wisdom.
- Chi-ch’eng
When it is dark enough, you can see the stars.There must be a lot of darkness tonight; there are (at least) a hundred billion stars in our galaxy alone.
(-Charles A. Beard)
The Tables TurnedThere is much for us to watch and receive. All that is required is that we watch, and receive.
Up! up! my Friend, and quit your books;
Or surely you'll grow double:
Up! up! my Friend, and clear your looks;
Why all this toil and trouble?
The sun above the mountain's head,
A freshening lustre mellow
Through all the long green fields has spread,
His first sweet evening yellow.
Books! 'tis a dull and endless strife:
Come, hear the woodland linnet,
How sweet his music! on my life,
There's more of wisdom in it.
And hark! how blithe the throstle sings!
He, too, is no mean preacher:
Come forth into the light of things,
Let Nature be your teacher.
She has a world of ready wealth,
Our minds and hearts to bless--
Spontaneous wisdom breathed by health,
Truth breathed by cheerfulness.
One impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man,
Of moral evil and of good,
Than all the sages can.
Sweet is the lore which Nature brings;
Our meddling intellect
Mis-shapes the beauteous forms of things:--
We murder to dissect.
Enough of Science and of Art;
Close up those barren leaves;
Come forth, and bring with you a heart
That watches and receives.
(- Poem by William Wordsworth)
There's a way in which each us makes small choices every day. And after a period of time those choices develop into a pattern, and we might be thought of as choosing ourselves. ...It's like any one of us -- we choose our way to being ourselves."Who do we choose to be?
(Spoken by brother of one of the American women).
desolate -- 1: devoid of inhabitants and visitors : desertedThe Writer's Almanac points out that today is the birthday of Vincent Van Gogh:
2: joyless, disconsolate, and sorrowful through or as if through separation from a loved one
3 a: showing the effects of abandonment and neglect : dilapidated b: barren, lifeless c: devoid of warmth, comfort, or hope : gloomy
His brother Theo was an art dealer, and for years he had supplied Van Gogh with a small monthly stipend. In return, Van Gogh gave his brother every canvas he painted. He wrote thousands of letters to Theo. "How much sadness there is in life," he wrote. "The right thing is to work." He moved to a small town north of Paris and painted feverishly until insanity overtook him. He cut off part of his own ear and was placed in an asylum at St. Rémy. One of his greatest paintings, Starry Night (1889), was painted while he was confined there. He left the asylum for good in the spring of 1890. In July, just as he was starting to receive favorable attention for his work, he committed suicide. Shortly before he died, he wrote "I feel a failure."Monastics know desolation and attempt to live through it. They attend to Philippians 1:21, "For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain." There is an attitude of prayer that sees and accepts troubles as material for building one's life.
(--Garrison Keillor, 30March2008 The Writer's Almanac)
To practice Zen, you need deep roots.What's harder, I suppose, is a mind that comprehends that none of us are abandoned, none of us alone. That mind, not often attained, sees and comprehends that the words "Love your neighbor as yourself" are as simple and direct a revelation as any Zen Master might present in a koan. Our neighbor is our self.
People with deep roots are rare.
In the past anyone could practice Zen.
But not now.
Zen depends completely on yourself.
It’s much harder, especially now.
- Sheng-hi
If ye wonder whether evil karma can be neutralized or not,I don't often see nor comprehend this truth. Emotions, blindness, unwillingness to confront demons of divisiveness all trip me up. Sometimes I depart. I abandon the work of deconstructing a self that wants to dominate any particular landscape it thinks it can. I absent myself from the congregate and imagine they are cause of my disconsolation.
Then know that it is neutralized by desire for goodness.
But they who knowingly do evil deeds,
Exchange a mouthful of food for infamy.
They who knowing not whither they themselves are bound,
Yet presume to pose as guides for others,
Do injury both to themselves and others.
If pain and sorrow ye desire sincerely to avoid,
Avoid, then, doing harm to others.
(- W.Y. Evans-Wentz, Tibets Great Yogi Milarepa , from Everyday Mind, a Tricycle book edited by Jean Smith)
On bookshelf of Hermitage Library is a title Try Giving Yourself Away, by David Dunn. He ends the book with the words:It takes all kinds of people to make an interesting world, and it takes all kinds of experiences to make an interesting life.Anyone doing anything affects everyone. Thus, Dunn's "we" and "our" in his final sentence refers to all of us. In a desolate time the prayer for good harvest is heartfelt.
We can never escape from people; and we will never cease having experiences. The art of truly successful living is to mix the people and the experiences that make up our individual lives in such fashion that they produce the greatest possible harvest of happiness, for ourselves and those around us.
The surest way I know to do this is by giving ourselves away, not just as a hobby -- though there is no possible objection to starting it on a hobby basis-- but on a day-in-and-day-day-out way of life. It calls for god will toward everybody with whom we rub elbows -- in or family life (where assuredly it should start), in our daily work, even our fleeting contacts with strangers.
At times it will require all the kindliness, understanding and tolerance we can muster, and a firm determination not to be discouraged by the occasional repulses we will suffer or the times when our giving will be met with suspicious cynicism. But if we persist in sowing seeds of friendliness, helpfulness and good will all along the way, we will find ourselves traveling a Happy Road in the company of a host of wonderful friends, and hugely enjoying life in spite of its troubles and vicissitudes. What is more, we will be sowing a rich harvest for our later years.
(--pp.127,128 in Try Giving Yourself Away, by David Dunn, Prentice Hall, 1947)
In a Dark TimeIt's time.
In a dark time, the eye begins to see,
I meet my shadow in the deepening shade;
I hear my echo in the echoing wood--
A lord of nature weeping to a tree,
I live between the heron and the wren,
Beasts of the hill and serpents of the den.What's madness but nobility of soul
At odds with circumstance? The day's on fire!
I know the purity of pure despair,
My shadow pinned against a sweating wall,
That place among the rocks--is it a cave,
Or winding path? The edge is what I have.A steady storm of correspondences!
Dark, dark my light, and darker my desire.
A night flowing with birds, a ragged moon,
And in broad day the midnight come again!
A man goes far to find out what he is--
Death of the self in a long, tearless night,
All natural shapes blazing unnatural light.
My soul, like some heat-maddened summer fly,
Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I?
A fallen man, I climb out of my fear.
The mind enters itself, and God the mind,
And one is One, free in the tearing wind.
(--Poem by Theodore Roethke)
The entire universe is one bright pearl.Woman writes from Manhattan saying she walks to past haunts along city's streets; the first time in 34 years, she says, amazing to be here, or anywhere, with no "hafta be back." or for that matter, no "hafta do" anything.
When the right time comes,
The essence of the bright pearl can be grasped;
It is suspended in emptiness,
Hidden in the lining of clothes,
Found under the chin of dragons
And in the headdresses of kings.
This pearl is always inside our clothing,
That is, inside us, our real nature.
Do not think about putting it on the surface;
Is should be kept in headdresses and under jaws.
Never attempt to wear it on the surface.
Essay on the PersonalStrange.
Because finally the personal
is all that matters,
we spend years describing stones,
chairs, abandoned farmhouses—
until we're ready. Always
it's a matter of precision,
what it feels like
to kiss someone or to walk
out the door. How good it was
to practice on stones
which were things we could love
without weeping over. How good
someone else abandoned the farmhouse,
bankrupt and desperate.
Now we can bring a fine edge
to our parents. We can hold hurt
up to the sun for examination.
But just when we think we have it,
the personal goes the way of
belief. What seemed so deep
begins to seem naive, something
that could be trusted
because we hadn't read Plato
or held two contradictory ideas
or women in the same day.
Love, then, becomes an old movie.
Loss seems so common
it belongs to the air,
to breath itself, anyone's.
We're left with style, a particular
way of standing and saying,
the idiosyncratic look
at the frown which means nothing
until we say it does. Years later,
long after we believed it peculiar
to ourselves, we return to love.
We return to everything
strange, inchoate, like living
with someone, like living alone,
settling for the partial, the almost
satisfactory sense of it.
(--Poem by Stephen Dunn)
Kuei-shan was asked, “Is there any further cultivation for people who have suddenly awakened?”Thinking back about insistence of war merchants to rearrange Middle East in our image depresses. Those in power now have near unlimited permission to act however they wish.
He replied, “If they awaken truly, realizing the fundamental, they know instinctively when it happens. The question of cultivation or not is two-sided. Suppose beginners have conditionally attained a moment of sudden awakening to inherent truth, but there are still longstanding habit energies that cannot as yet be cleared all at once? They must be taught to clear away streams of consciousness manifesting habitual activity. That is cultivation, but there cannot be a particular doctrine to have them practice or devote themselves to.
- Kuei-Shan (771-854)
Cat finally settles to his quadrant of bed. Night quiets. Dark silences. Solitude visits.Technique of non-reactionWood goes into stove for burning. It snowed today. Everything white again. Ice from ceder tree falls on skylight.
Shantideva mentions specific instances when it is advisable to remain like a mindless piece of wood. We can do this when our mind is very distracted or when the thought arises to belittle, slander, or abuse others. If pride, haughtiness or the intention to find fault with others arises, we can also remain impassive until our deluded motivation fades. Feeling pretentious, thinking to deceive others and wishing to praise our own qualities, wealth, or possessions are all occasions when it is wise to pretend that we are made out of wood. Whenever we have the desire to blame others, speak harshly or cause disruption we should practice this technique of non-reaction.
(- Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, Meaningful to Behold, from Everyday Mind, a Tricycle book edited by Jean Smith)
Lastly, he showed himself to the Eleven themselves while they were at table. He reproached them for their incredulity and obstinacy, because they had refused to believe those who had seen him after he had risen. And he said to them, ‘Go out to the whole world; proclaim the Good News to all creation.We might not know why.
(--Mark 16: 14-15, from Easter Saturday)
My hut lies in the middle of a dense forest;Do I think it is possible to be a hermit in the open?
Every year the green ivy grows longer.
No news of the affairs of men,
Only the occasional song of a woodcutter.
The sun shines and I mend my robe;
When the moon comes out I read Buddhist poems.
I have nothing to report my friends.
If you want to find the meaning, stop chasing after
so many things.
--Ryokan
"A poem begins with a lump in the throat; a homesickness or a love-sickness. It is a reaching out toward expression, an effort to find fulfillment. A complete poem is one where an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found the word."The German monk in the retreat house kitchen asked a third time, then listened to my response about hito. He looked at me.
And, "In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on."
When I look within and see that I am nothing, that is wisdom. When I look without and see that I am everything, that is love. And between these two, my life turns.Is there any remaining need to believe what any one else believes with regard to what is God, or Christ, or enlightenment, or truth? If there is anything to what stands around, then see for yourself -- or perhaps, more to the point, see yourself.
(— Nisargadatta Maharaj, quoted by Adyashanti)
“Sages since time immemorial have only explained the problems of pollution. If one does not have all that false consciousness, emotional and intellectual opinionatedness, and conceptual habituation, one is clear as autumn water, pure and uncontrived, placid and uninhibited. Such people are called Wayfarers, or free people.”A wayfarer is one traveling as one stands around.
- Kuei-Shan (771-854)
Ortega y Gasset's well-known definition of Man -- Yo soy yo y mi circunstancia, "I am myself and my environment" -- should be understood as a strict anthropological statement. The environment belongs to me and not only influences me, but is part and parcel of my self, even if not exhaustively so.Individuality is undividedness.
Not only time and space in general, but concrete temporal and spatial things condition my life and my Being; they are part of my life and my Being. Not only do my friends and the people I live and talk with reveal me and shape me, but the world around me conditions me and is me, as well. I am as much a passive element as an active factor. Our Being is not what we often call our individuality. (--p.146, Epilogue, Aspects of a Cosmotheandric Spirituality, in The Cosmotheandric Experience, Emerging Religious Consciousness, by Raimon Panikkar, c.1993)
