Yes, why meditate? I even find that I still ask this question, but what is the point of any answer to any question? The "answer" I feel lies in the experience.
I have learned from my meditation over the years, that in life there is no comparison between one person and another, between one thing or situation and another. But in the mind there is!
There is a saying in Zen that states "without you the universe would be incomplete".
The feeling that everything is fruitless is just a feeling and in life, all things, including feelings, are impermanent and subject to change. To feel negative about life today, will disappear to manifest a feeling of positivity tomorrow. But no point in chasing tomorrow as it doesn't exist. Be with whatever is so right now, and see that there is no comparison between what is, and what isn't. Because what isn't doesn't exist. All is what is!
Opinions, are just opinions and are just as subject to the change.
And because of this universal truth, opinions, are not really real because they disappear and become changed.
The only reality is here and now. What you can sense; what you can feel. But then, the here and now is instantly gone.
So if you can contemplate these lines, the experience may feel strange at first, particularly if you have not really come here before, but it can be quite empowering.
Perfect Zazen!!
At first, I felt distracted and my mind urged me to get up and close it just to make my zazen silent and "perfect". Yet, a deeper part of me that knew that I just needed to connect with whatever arose in zazen. Perhaps this deeper part was "true" self. But one never knows in Zen, as not knowing is a desirable and "perfect" state. Did I mention desire there? Did I mention perfect!? What illusion! What paradox!
Anyway, whatever happened, I slipped into a state of just listening. The door would touch its framework and then nothing. Touch its framework again, and then nothing. No rhythm at all, so I didn't know when the next noise would occur. I realized that I was anticipating the noise and had slipped out of the immediate moment. The noise wouldn't come and just as I felt relief that I could get on with zazen, there is was again! I knew this was not correct practice! But reminded myself that there is no correct practice without there being incorrect practice.. Trapped in dualism again?
Then it all stopped. The noise came and went, came and went, and it was OK. Zen became perfectly imperfect. Without expectation or disappointment that my zazen hadn't been… Perfect! Ha!
Past and Future: Non-existent. Peace of the Moment.
This is a copy of a response to a discussion post I have done on myLot forum...
As a Zen practitioner I do not follow any conventional religion but through my practice of zazen every day I have no beliefs about what is to happen at some future time or when I am dead.
My Zen practice takes me to the truth that the future does not exist and neither does the past. How can it!? There is only now, and it is constantly available. The moment of now, disappears immediately and cannot return again. If you can understand, the past is an illusion - that is, it is not real. The future is also an illusion and not real. Only now can exist. If I am to keep looking and focusing on this moment of now, I am focusing on the only reality that exists. My mind becomes still, and I connect with everything in my awareness that exists.
There cannot be fear, only when I allow my mind to fear what may be in the future, which I have already established (within myself), is not real! So that means I fear what is not there! A ghost!
I have found that no matter what I experience whether I be comfortable or in pain, if I just stay focused on this moment of existence as it comes and goes, I recognize that nature provides me with a natural inclination to the peace and calmness of the here and now.
Generally society, does not teach this, but teaches us to focus on the future all the time. Get better, richer, healthier and do not rest on the moment, for we have to "improve life" constantly! The truth I have found is that we can only really improve the quality of our life by being focused here and now and becoming totally mindful of what we are doing or experiencing. We are not working things out, so much as allowing nature to allow us to evolve and grow. Contemplating these ideas in meditation, I have found for myself, that problems have a tendency to sort themselves out. It is our very being (or soul) that allows energy to flow allowing such evolution to naturally occur.
I thought with this post, that I would share my experience and insights with you.. If you just look within yourself, I feel you may find something far more valuable than any beliefs that come from outside yourself. My truth cannot be yours, and yours cannot be mine, but we can certainly find our own and they will sound remarkably similar...
Please feel free to share your insights or experiences..
Love and light..
As a Zen practitioner I do not follow any conventional religion but through my practice of zazen every day I have no beliefs about what is to happen at some future time or when I am dead.
My Zen practice takes me to the truth that the future does not exist and neither does the past. How can it!? There is only now, and it is constantly available. The moment of now, disappears immediately and cannot return again. If you can understand, the past is an illusion - that is, it is not real. The future is also an illusion and not real. Only now can exist. If I am to keep looking and focusing on this moment of now, I am focusing on the only reality that exists. My mind becomes still, and I connect with everything in my awareness that exists.
There cannot be fear, only when I allow my mind to fear what may be in the future, which I have already established (within myself), is not real! So that means I fear what is not there! A ghost!
I have found that no matter what I experience whether I be comfortable or in pain, if I just stay focused on this moment of existence as it comes and goes, I recognize that nature provides me with a natural inclination to the peace and calmness of the here and now.
Generally society, does not teach this, but teaches us to focus on the future all the time. Get better, richer, healthier and do not rest on the moment, for we have to "improve life" constantly! The truth I have found is that we can only really improve the quality of our life by being focused here and now and becoming totally mindful of what we are doing or experiencing. We are not working things out, so much as allowing nature to allow us to evolve and grow. Contemplating these ideas in meditation, I have found for myself, that problems have a tendency to sort themselves out. It is our very being (or soul) that allows energy to flow allowing such evolution to naturally occur.
I thought with this post, that I would share my experience and insights with you.. If you just look within yourself, I feel you may find something far more valuable than any beliefs that come from outside yourself. My truth cannot be yours, and yours cannot be mine, but we can certainly find our own and they will sound remarkably similar...
Please feel free to share your insights or experiences..
Love and light..
Zen: Just Awareness
Zen. It is just awareness! When it is not present, it is present, but through the ego we are stuck in the pretence that we are not aware! A rock and a hard place, for to try and be aware is a desire and will only cause us to sink into the quicksand of the finite mind. So what do we do to become aware? Exactly!
If we want to get it right, then it will be wrong. So, we need to transcend both right and wrong to that state of awareness where we get the experience that everything is just so.
If we want to get it right, then it will be wrong. So, we need to transcend both right and wrong to that state of awareness where we get the experience that everything is just so.
Letting Go
Letting go needs to be on a moment to moment basis in order to remain focused in the here and now.
But to have such a desire to achieve this, wouldn't work, because desire would immediately bring one back into a world where the random, planning mind would once again be in control.
Letting go, in each moment of now, is liberating and the way to mindfulness. It is quite simply Zen. As all is.
But to have such a desire to achieve this, wouldn't work, because desire would immediately bring one back into a world where the random, planning mind would once again be in control.
Letting go, in each moment of now, is liberating and the way to mindfulness. It is quite simply Zen. As all is.
In Zen. What is Absolute Truth? Is it Truth That We Lie?
I have just involved myself in an on-line discussion on why people lie. It will be interesting to see what reponses I get, but being a very Zen answer. What I have written can be quite challenging to some, so there may not be any responses at all.
As a Zen practitioner and therapist, I have studied the tendency to lie. In Zen I aim to deal in absolutes, that is, we are either lying or telling the truth. Lying is usually done out of some sort of fear. The fear could be great or small. For instance if you see someone who is wearing what you believe to be an awful outfit, but they seem very proud of it, it may difficult to tell absolute truth because there is a fear. Not a big-deal fear, but a fear of offending them. It is easier to say that it's nice, than to say it is hideous and doesn't suite them at all. So, it is not easy to tell the absolute truth all of the time.
Another part of this equation is that the mind exists on a lie, meaning that what we may totally believe is a lie.
For instance, in Zen, the truth is that whenever we judge another person, we are judging our self. But we totally believe that we are judging and perhaps blaming another person for something that upsets us. This is not so.
We can only perceive the other person as part of our own awareness, which we consider to be our self and then we create our ideas of what they are like, but thos ideas still isn't truth. It is only our ideas about what may be truth.
So judging others is judging our own awareness which we believe to be our self! It's a neat trap, if you can understand what I'm saying here. Most of life, we are strongly identified with our self as being separate from others in the world, This is another lie. But no-one will believe you if you were to realize this, because believing is not truth either, only realization and experiencing is! Only now is true as the past or future which we may think of as being real, is not truth.
As a Zen practitioner, I am as honest as living in this world permits me to be, and to tell absolute truth is a great challenge whilst the mind keeps interfering!
Nothing wrong or right about that, so it's best not to worry about it.
Can we really say that there is truth in the world everywhere we look? I think there may be more untruth than truth in the world. That's is a mystery that I love about Zen practice!
Please click here if you want to read the discussion or responses... Or lack of them! Or sign in/sign up and respond yourself.
As a Zen practitioner and therapist, I have studied the tendency to lie. In Zen I aim to deal in absolutes, that is, we are either lying or telling the truth. Lying is usually done out of some sort of fear. The fear could be great or small. For instance if you see someone who is wearing what you believe to be an awful outfit, but they seem very proud of it, it may difficult to tell absolute truth because there is a fear. Not a big-deal fear, but a fear of offending them. It is easier to say that it's nice, than to say it is hideous and doesn't suite them at all. So, it is not easy to tell the absolute truth all of the time.
Another part of this equation is that the mind exists on a lie, meaning that what we may totally believe is a lie.
For instance, in Zen, the truth is that whenever we judge another person, we are judging our self. But we totally believe that we are judging and perhaps blaming another person for something that upsets us. This is not so.
We can only perceive the other person as part of our own awareness, which we consider to be our self and then we create our ideas of what they are like, but thos ideas still isn't truth. It is only our ideas about what may be truth.
So judging others is judging our own awareness which we believe to be our self! It's a neat trap, if you can understand what I'm saying here. Most of life, we are strongly identified with our self as being separate from others in the world, This is another lie. But no-one will believe you if you were to realize this, because believing is not truth either, only realization and experiencing is! Only now is true as the past or future which we may think of as being real, is not truth.
As a Zen practitioner, I am as honest as living in this world permits me to be, and to tell absolute truth is a great challenge whilst the mind keeps interfering!
Nothing wrong or right about that, so it's best not to worry about it.
Can we really say that there is truth in the world everywhere we look? I think there may be more untruth than truth in the world. That's is a mystery that I love about Zen practice!
Please click here if you want to read the discussion or responses... Or lack of them! Or sign in/sign up and respond yourself.
Judgement: Memoirs of an Encounter Group: A Zen Challenge
My challenge as a Zen practitioner and group therapist was not to judge. And I found it to be a great challenge as judgements came up, In fact judgement still arises - for its roots seem ancient - imbedded in my mind as in the society I belong to.
In my encounter groups, I used profanity a lot to "shock" people into awareness. Bashing people with a Zen stick, wouldn't have made me very popular and would probably have got me arrested!
Yes, the judging mind raised its objection and considered such ways of communicating as bad, so I had to get past my judgemental considerations because I wanted to cause a stir in my groups.
Once past that first hurdle of my judgemental mind, the space in the group room became what I can best describe as light and free as the language amongst the participants got to be more expressive and although encounter groups are based more on spiritual development than therapy, such expression provided the space for some very rapid and therapeutic effects to take place.
In my encounter groups, I used profanity a lot to "shock" people into awareness. Bashing people with a Zen stick, wouldn't have made me very popular and would probably have got me arrested!
Yes, the judging mind raised its objection and considered such ways of communicating as bad, so I had to get past my judgemental considerations because I wanted to cause a stir in my groups.
Once past that first hurdle of my judgemental mind, the space in the group room became what I can best describe as light and free as the language amongst the participants got to be more expressive and although encounter groups are based more on spiritual development than therapy, such expression provided the space for some very rapid and therapeutic effects to take place.
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