Earth Hour

Last night was Earth Hour.  From 8:30 to 9:30 PM, people world wide (their local time) were asked to turn off everything that used electricity in their homes.  In our home we lit candles in the zendo and went and sat, without a timer.  It was a very interesting experience and revealed a lot to me about the subtle way (as well as the gross) that I rely on technology in my life.

The process itself was very beautiful.  Normally I use an electronic timer to mark my periods of sitting.  Sitting without one of any type felt very open.  I have sat down to sit without a timer before, but the agenda of the day often creeps in, quietly pointing out all the other things that need to get done.  Last night, at least for an hour, there was no agenda.

In my sitting practice I am finding that there are both subtle and gross levels of commentary that creep up in the mind.  Gross commentary is what we normally recognize as distraction in sitting.  Some thought comes up and we follow it, feeding it, helping it to grow and develop.  When we notice we have done this, we acknowledge it, let go and return to the practice.  Not putting energy into the subtle commentary is more difficult.  Subtle commentary is some form of "oh you are doing that again" or a charged spike of "ahhh-haaaa" or "hmmmmph".  Early on in my practice, I found that the subtle commentary was very helpful, as it was the voice that pointed out the gross commentary.  However, even on its own, the subtle commentary can pull us away from the moment.  Although subtle commentary does not  tend to grow and unfold if given energy, it still moves into the foreground of the mind, obscuring the broad scene.  I have the sense that this too should float by without receiving undo attention.

We did not sit the whole hour.  After a certain amount of time, we brought some of the candles upstairs, poured wine, sat down on the couch and watched the world sit and rest through our front window.

Warning Sign

As an addition to my most recent post, I noticed something about the energy when I am wrapped up in the small self.  When I am spiralling in on my small self, I can often delude myslef that these thought s are justified and real.  That they are the natural consequnce of my situation.  At these times I feel my Ki focussed in my head and upper chest.  When I relax and let the details be, ceasing to put energy into these circumstances (not telling the story), I can feel the Ki flow down into my abdomen and flow to other parts of my body.  This feels like more than an issue of muscular tension.  There is a shift in body mind and spirit at these times.  I have no idea if one precedes the other, but when the tension goes, natural flow of energy takes its place.

Grand Funk (no Railraod)

For reasons that make no practical sense, I spent the last few days n one of the worst moods I have been in in a long time.  Everything I encoutnered seemed to be flawed, wrong and crushing.  My wife put in a lot of effort trying to help, but it did not seem to have an impact.  Granted, that fact that she would not let this slide by forced me to find a way to address it.

Although there were lots of moments where my funk was on auto-pilot, I did find ways to engage this as practice.  It has been a real benefit that recently I learned about the practice of just watching these patterns unfold, even when I did not feel I had the power to interrupt them.  Putting attention on these feelings really did take the edge off, but they still remained. 

Much of it came from two sources.  First a feeling of being out of control (which actually has a deepr root, which is my attempt to control what is happenening beyond what is natural).  I spent a lot of the last weeks getting things done.  It happened at such a remarkable pace that I locked in to that frame of mind.  When the tasks were done, the mindset was still strong and getting hot and heavy with the ego.

The second source is an older issue of not feeling valued.  In the end it goes to the same root of trying to control things.  This shows up for me as a feeling that everything I saw and do is being discounted or contradicted by others.

What happened here was a short lived, very un happy place.  Practicing it, seeing that it is of my creation I was able to slow it down.  Slowed down, I was able to get a much better sense of where it was coming from, and thus what work I need to do to reduce these tendencies.  The whole thing was very emotionally tiring.

There was also a backdrop that I realized created furtile ground for this whole spiral.  I have spent much of the last week very up in my own head.  When that part of me got out of control, I robbed myself of many moments, prefering instead to intellectualize the things that were happening.  As the process became pessimistic, that thought process was never  a good thing.

Keep in mind that all of this unfolded rather quickly and all of this is post analysis.  I am greatly appreciative however, of all the bodhisattvas that brought medicine.  Mirrors, the practice, etc.

I endeavour to take up the way of better manifesting what I know to be helpful.

...are of supreme importance

Tonight, Just a little over an hour ago, I learned of the death of a dear friend of my family.  The loss of Mr. Evans is raw and unfolding in my heart as I write this.  There is something to express here, that simply would not have the same flavor if I waited to digest it.

The things that were so wonderful about my friend are not lost in his death.  In this raw moment, I feel the love, humor and compassion that flowed so effortlessly from his being.  I do not feel it coming to me from outside, but rather arising from inside my heart, my hara, my soul.  Mr. Evans is in my being.  Having connected with me in such an open and loving way in my life, he infused his compassion and joy into my being.  Or rather, he nurtured it in me.

I did not see Mr. Evans on a regular basis.  He knew me when I was a baby.  Through my life, it was often years between visits.  The visits themselves were casual and brief.  However, my family and I did travel to stay with him and his wife in the summer a couple of years ago.  There were no major sight seeing agendas or other legs to the journey.  We simple went to spend time with them.  We played cards, walked in the woods, shared meals, sent swimming and sat and talked.  Looking back, it was spectacular.  I have been to Disney, gone on a cruise, seen Las Vegas and toured the sights of Ottawa.  I have drive across the country and climbed mountains.  But this one visit was far more spectacular.  For here, we just came together, as we were, and shared our experience.  They opened their home to us and we all shared our lives.  However briefly, we shared our lives.  In the sharing, the most basic and beautiful parts of ourselves connected.  (Mr. and Mrs. Evans, I thank you deeply for this.)

This is all any of us can do.  We are here very briefly, and in that time we might run from sight to sight, and we might seek out some spectacular experiences, but out marvelous activity is in the sharing of our lives.  The sharing nurtures love, joy and and compassion.

After I lose someone in my life, and experience an amplified affinity for those I encounter that is raw and tender.  As the person leaves my life bodily, the love joy and compassion that I shared with them flows out of me into all my other relationships.  It does not matter if it is a a friend, my Dad, the child of a co-worker or someone in my community whom I have never met.  Cultivating that love, joy and compassion with all beings is the greatest work.  The way of the Bodhisattva.

Letting go and growing up

This morning, my wife left for the Dominican Republic with a friend of ours who was looking for a traveling companion for March break.  The arising and unfolding of this vacation was an incredibly rich opportunity for practice.

My wife is amazing.  She has always been very supportive of my efforts in Aikido, Zen and other things.  She has made it possible for me to go to retreats, seminars, and weekly training.  We have always approached our relationship in terms of doing whatever is needed to help the other grow and be fulfilled.  She definitely needed and deserved this vacation.

However, I stumbled out of the starting blocks in the supportive husband category on this one.  It was very comical, juvenile stuff.  I have never been anywhere warm for March break.  I have never been to the Dominican.  She was taking her first "sit around and do nothing" vacation of her adult life and was doing it without me.  I encountered a very old, familiar, small me in these moments.  I reacted poorly enough that I actually made her feel bad about the vacation.  I pouted.  I needed to meet this moment better;  for me, for her, for everyone.

I recently listened to a podcast by Ryudo Rinsen Osho (and if you did not find this via the Toledo Zen Center, please check out the link to the Drinking Gourd Podcasts at the bottom of this post, or search for them on iTunes).  In this particular talk Rinsen Osho made a point about equating.  For one thing to equal another thing, there must be two things, and thus separation.  In this event, I had looked at my wife and our relationship in terms of equality.  Now, in general equality is a good thing.  Moving towards equality from a state of inequality has helped many aspects of our society improve over the last few hundred years.  However, in the practice of my marriage, I see that this is not going to cut it.

In the vows I took so many years ago, I joined with my wife.  In an age where promises are broken, contracts ripped in two and marriages torn asunder, we have never doubted that our union was permanent and that our lives were a loving, working relationship.  In this, we have been extremely blessed.  Although we are very different people, working and living for the benefit of both as one and one as both has been our greatest strength.

In the end, I got my feet back underneath me and found the joy in sending her on this wonderful experience with our good friend.  Now, if I can just get caught up on laundry while she is gone, she is REALLY going to feel the love.

It's finally spring; or is it?

Today I came out the grocery store to greet a beautiful spring morning.  Overcast and cool, the air was filled with singing birds and low drone of small town traffic in the early hours.  Suddenly, I was hit with the memory of the same place as I experienced it in the dead night of winter.  Cold, dark and desolate, it seemed like a very different place.  But is it?  Is this place a function of the weather it encounters?  What about the buildings?  10 years ago, the parking lot was a back alley, high with weeds, cut by a dirt path formed by generations of foot-falls.  This place is very clear to me, but the day, season, weather and urbanization are in continual flux.

In fact, the character of this place is subtle and unseen.  At any one moment, each of these factors are part of the experience of the location, but the place is not these things.  Thinking back later in the day, it still seems impossible to put a description to the ever present thread that cut through that parking lot, but its presence is undeniable.  Is this Meton's "Rabbitness of God", or Zen's "original face before your parents were born"? 

I realize now, that this indescribable, subtly perceivable character is not confined to the parking lot of my grocery store.  It pervades everywhere, although most of the time I don't perceive it.

Stopping and breathing in the moment, I think to myself, "Spring has arrived".  But the inherent beauty of the experience; the canvas on which these paints settle and dry is always present, containing the entire universe, following everywhere.

The Story So Far...

If I had to identify the two primary factors that set me down the path toward Zen practice, they would be Catholicism and ADDHD.  Growing up I had a lot of difficulty sitting still and paying attention.  When I was old enough to become an alter server, I took the opportunity.  Being involved in the mass gave a sense of being involved in spiritual practice (and having something to do during church).  Outside of church, my parents enrolled me in Tae Kwon Do so that I could develop some self-discipline to deal with my attention and hyperactivity problems.  The middle school and high school years, these two activities served me well. When I went away to university, both fell to the wayside.  Although those particular forms fell away, they left their mark.  I continued to maintain a great interest in the spiritual journey and in Asian culture.

My university years eventually lead me in the direction of teaching.  When I left teachers college, I was hired to teach history and World Religions in a small Catholic high school in rural Ontario.  Although I had studied religion in university, the focus was purely Christian and Catholic.  World religions were just never a part of what I interested in.  I taught that first year from the textbook, and set into summer vacation with the intent of visiting places of spiritual practice in the major traditions.  An internet search on Buddhism lead me to the homepage of Zen Mountain Monastery.  That summer I made the day long drive to Mount Tremper and participated in an introduction to Zen practice retreat.  I had prepared myself by doing some zazen based on descriptions I found online.  The retreat itself was a pivotal experience in my life.  Although it would take some time to clarify my new found drive, I sensed that there was a resonance that went much deeper than the trappings of the Japanese monastic model.

I did my best to maintain my home practice, which to me just meant zazen.  The following year I returned to ZMM and participated in my first sesshin.  This was another major experience in my life.  For the next six years or so, I continued my home practice with a drive that both ebbed and flowed, but never vanished.  Returning home to Amherstburg, I set out to find supports for my home practice, using ZMM's eight gates of Zen as a model.  Pursuing my interest in Japanese culture, I began training in Aikido as a form of body practice.  I also began looking for a sitting group that worked in the tradition of Zen Mountain Monastery.  I contacted a man in Detroit, who redirected me to Toledo, where, in the spring of 2004, I met Jay Chikyo Weik.

Jay and his wife Karen ran the Toledo Meditation Group in a portion of Jay's Aikido dojo.  Over the years I visited occasionally for some combination of Aikido and Zen practice, turning to Jay with questions periodically.  As a satellite member of this growing group I observed many changes.  Jay changed teachers, and he and his wife were given new Dharma names;  Rinsen and Do'on.  The community began to grow in size and depth.  Rinsen began giving dharma talks, established the Drinking Gourd Podcasts, offering retreats and doing private interviews.  

As the meditation group grew into the Toledo Zen Center, it's gravity pulled me in and helped my practice dig under my skin.  In February of 2010, TZC celebrate two important ceremonies, the ordination of Rinsen and Do'on as Zen Priests, and TZC's first Jukai ceremony.  I was fortunate enough t be part of that first group of 16 practitioners to receive the precepts.

That is the simple summary of the vast confluence of circumstances that has brought me to this point in my life.  The forces that move my life are ever changing, and my choices thus far have lead me in a good direction.  It is my hope that keeping this blog will be an enriching practice, and of use to others.

Gassho,

-Kaishin