Adventuring Together

This is the last morning of our virtual retreat. We have been weaving formal Zen meditation into the fabric of our lives. As Zen retreats always are, it has been challenging and wonderful. Though I have been on countless of these rigorous training retreats, I am always surprised by what arises—both within me and within each person that participates.

Who would think that sitting still and meeting what arises with compassion and curiosity would be so wild and difficult? But when we slow down enough to be where we really are, we discover that all of life slows down with us and meets us in each moment. And all of life includes a range far beyond any image or plan we might have in our mind.

It turns out that we humans are travelers through a vast geography that moves from landscapes of ease and delight, to dark lands of fear and anxiety. Ordinarily we meet this flux with attempts to protect and control. We automatically think: ‘I’ll just try for more of the good stuff. What I don’t like, I’ll fix, avoid or pretend it’s not there’. From this perspective, our life becomes the exhausting and endless work of fixing, avoiding and pretending.

In our Zen practice, we make the unusual vow to let things be as they are. This is not a matter of believing some special doctrine, but of being willing to be an explorer in our own lives. The teachings of Zen are not to be studied, believed and held onto. Rather they are signposts to suggest places to look and areas to explore.

When we allow things to be as they are (including ourselves) we find that life is far beyond whatever we thought it was. Though words are a wonderful part of life, life itself is far beyond anything we can say about it. The mysterious aliveness of life equally resides beyond the edge of infinity and in this very moment. Whatever we call this mystery—God, Allah, Buddha nature, universal love—only points to something beyond our conception.

Everything is included in this vast and shimmering web of vibration we call life. Each thing arises from the inconceivable source, lives and maintains itself with support of everything else, and disappears back to the inconceivable source. Now it appears as the sound of the bird. Now as the fathomless sorrow that lives in my heart. Now as the ease of leaning my head back and looking up at the morning sky.

Everything is sacred. Not one single thing is left out. Our problems and our anxieties. Our failures and our terrible flaws. Our secret joys and our unseen sorrows. Everything is included.

In these still unusual Zen Zoom retreats, we support each other to do this deep and essential human work. Alone together and together alone, we each dive into what is already here to learn how to be who we already are. We get lost. We get found. We begin slowly and quickly to realize what we have always known.

Life is a precious gift and we are all part of the vast and wondrous river of life.