thenatureofmind

How To Do Zazen

How to do Zazen - Seated Meditation

4 Qualities of Mind that Alleviate Suffering

1. Metta - Loving Kindness
2. Karuna - Compassion
3. Mudita - To feel joy in the joy of others
4. Upekkha - Equanimity

4 Qualities of Mind that Alleviate Suffering

On Not Being Shifted Around by the Winds of Change

If you want to snatch a bit of leisure while you are busy, you ought to find a handle while you are at leisure. If you want to gain some quiet amidst clamor and noise, you ought first master the art of sitting quietly. There is no one who can otherwise avoid being shifted around by circumstances, fluttering at the mercy of things.

Vegetable Roots Discourse Caigentan By Hong Zicheng Tr. by Robert Aiken w/ Daniel W. Y. Kwok

Linji Revisited

Someone asked, "What do you mean by the true Buddha, the true Dharma, and the true Way? Would you be good enough to explain to us?"

The Master [Linji] said, "Buddha—this is the cleanness and purity of the mind. The Dharma—this is the shining brightness of the mind. The Way—this is the pure light that is never obstructed anywhere. The three are in fact one. All are empty names and have no true reality." -Linji Yixuan (Died: c. 866)

-From: The Roaring Stream Ed. by Nelson Foster and Jack Shoemaker

Linji Mows the Lawn

"Those who have fulfilled the ten stages of bodhisattva practice are no better than hired field hands; those who have attained the enlightenment of the fifty-first and fifty-second stages are prisoners shackled and bound; arhats and pratyekabuddhas are so much filth in the latrine; bodhi and nirvana are hitching posts for donkeys."

- Línjì Yìxuán (Died c. 866): Founder of what was later to become the Rinzai school of Zen Buddhism

The Knowable

The limits of the knowable
Are unknowable.

- Eihei Dogen

No Self, No Other

There are no sentient beings to be delivered by the Tathagata. If even self has no objective existence how much less has other-than-self! Thus neither Buddha nor sentient beings exist objectively. -Huang Po, Wan Ling Record

The Circle of Awareness - The Phenomenal and the Noumenal

Just looking, notice that in the circle of your awareness there are many things which constitute the world of your awareness. Notice also that in your circle of awareness there is also something else and that is an awareness of what you call your own body, what you call yourself. So your circle of awareness contains both what you call yourself and what you call all that which is other than yourself. There is also in the circle of awareness something that you can't see but which is the basis and that something is awareness. Notice that no matter how you search for that awareness, you can't find it, yet it is the basis for the experience of this circle of awareness. Also notice that although the circle contains both self and other, there is no boundary between them, all co-exist inseparably in the circle of awareness and in fact if you were to identify with the awareness everything in the circle of awareness would seem to be other. The awareness however no matter how hard you search can not be found. The reason is that the awareness is the Noumenal. But what is the Noumenal?

The Noumenal is by definition without characteristics so we can't define it except to say just that. It is that which exists apart from our thinking. Having no characteristics, it has no location spatially or temporally. It does not exist in time and space but rather time and space exist in it. Having no characteristics, it has no boundaries and hence has no outside or inside thus it encompasses everything we call the phenomenal world. So in this circle of awareness, the awareness is not separate from anything in the circle. The Phenominal and the Noumenal are inextricably woven together.

There is only this. This circle, whole, undivided. No self, no other, just intrinsic awareness. No future, no past, no present, just this. There is no one looking!

When you return, the only thing that you can bring back with you is the excruciating love and compassion for this glorious whole. All beings wandering in a dream.

Thought <---> Thinker

In our ordinary way of thinking, if a bad thought arises in our mind, one that is unpleasant or is offensive in some way, we might also think: why am I thinking this? If a great thought arises, one that seems insightful or brilliant, we might say: I'm really smart for thinking this. Invariably, however it seems that one lets call it a primary thought arises and that is that I am thinking this. There is always the thought that if a thought arises, there is a corresponding thinker, but "I am thinking" is just a thought. In fact "I am" codependently arises with thoughts, persists in the presence of thoughts, but disappears when the thoughts disappear. When there are no thoughts, there is no thinker. In fact, there never has been a thinker, the thinker is just another thought that arises.

A Prayer for America

and Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Iran...

OM SVASTI Dharmakaya, unchanging unity of appearance and emptiness,
Vast expanse of youthful, great bliss,
Sky of spontaneously present joy free of defilement,
Bestow a feast of unchanging goodness upon us.

Through the seeds of inherently pure virtue
That arise from even a bit of glorious goodness,
And the bright smile of virtue revealed
By offering the light of these lamps to the three jewels,

May the well-being of a golden age arise
In this realm of the thousand-petalled lotus.
May this time of warfare and disputation be pacified.
May auspicious excellence, prosperity and goodness flourish.

Especially, throughout the land of America,
May the youthful lotus of teaching and practice bloom.
May innumerable oceans of realms be filled
With the melodious roar of the profound secret.

- H.H.Karmapa Urgyen Trinley, 16th of August 1999