31 Fundamental Teachings of Zen
- At January 04, 2021
- By drynick
- In Reflections
0
While looking for something else, I came across several pages of notes I had jotted down ten years ago. The notes are in the form a 31 bullet points followed by a short passage from the medieval Chinese Zen teacher Hongzhi. The title of my notes is ‘The Single Flower Way’. Single Flower Sangha is the name my teacher gave to the group he gathered around himself after he left the organization his teacher had gathered around himself (the Kwan Um School). His teacher had left a prestigious position in the hierarchy of Korean Zen (Son in Korean) to come to America and teach a group of hippies and intellectuals in the mid-1970’s. My teacher followed his teacher’s footsteps in the 1990’s and stepped away from a senior position in the world-wide organization based in Providence, Rhode Island that his teacher had created.
The Single Flower Sangha had no fixed geographic location. The only property it accumulated were the two-dozen pamphlet-style chant books that one of his students had made. My teacher carried these chant books and a few bells around in his suitcase as he led silent Zen retreats in people’s homes around the country, including here in the Boston area. There would be anywhere from six to twelve people who would come together for a weekend or week of intensive Zen training. Lots of sitting and silence. Simple food eaten in an informal style. One meeting with the teacher per day in the afternoon and one long Dharma talk in the morning. (Those were the good old days.) My teacher was uncomfortable with large crowds and suspicious of ongoing institutions, so this small and constantly vanishing community of students worked pretty well for him.
From the beginning my teacher encouraged Melissa and me to lead the group we were already leading. At first it was just four of us who gathered weekly in the back room of our house to sit quietly together. After a few years, with his permission and with the permission of the teacher Melissa was then studying with, we turned our weekly gathering into a Zen group and began giving short talks.
My teacher’s permission to me went like this: Me: ‘Would it be OK for Melissa and I to turn our meditation group into a Zen group and begin giving short talks about Zen?’ My Teacher: (after a short pause to look at the floor) ‘Well, I guess if you make sure to only speak from your own experience, you probably won’t do too much damage.’ So began my career as a Zen teacher, first with this informal and cautionary approval, and then, ten or so years later, with his formal (and still cautionary) approval.
My teacher was suspicious of all teachers and all organizations, including himself. He was right to be so. Even his small organization was subject to the conflict and blindness that run through all human affairs—just as we have been here at Boundless Way Temple—just as the Buddha’s first community was.
But my recently rediscovered notes on ‘The Single Flower Way’ are a series of 31 bullet points about the Zen way as I understood my teacher taught it. Most, but not all, the points have some phrases or sentences bolded for emphasis. I remember mentioning to my teacher that I was working on a list like this. He was utterly uninterested and even actively skeptical that there would be any value is a list of his particular Zen teachings.
As I look over the list, what I see in those bullet points this morning are the topics I come back to again and again in hundreds of Dharma talks I have now given. Reading each point, I smile and nod in recognition. I don’t know whether these are indeed my teacher’s teaching or my teachings. Perhaps it might be more accurate to say that they are simply the teachings of the Zen tradition that have come down to and through me.
The one that catches my attention this morning is this:
- There is no road-map. There is no system – only the trackless love of the universe. Burn your rulebook. Beyond form and emptiness, beyond koan practice, beyond Zen. The point of our practice is not Zen – it is aliveness.
I love this! (Of course I wrote it, so I may be biased.) Maybe tomorrow I’ll explore what it might mean. Maybe these 31 points are something that might be useful to share in some manner.
P.S. – I was taken by the idea that there were 31 of these bullet points (I counted carefully) but did not make the association, until I went to post this on my blog, to the 31 Prayers for January 2021 which I posted on the first day of this year. Hmmmmm….
Or Both
- At January 03, 2021
- By drynick
- In Reflections
- 0
I wake up
this morning
in vast space
without knowing
I lie still
and wait.
It’s not so bad
right here.
What if
this is
the blessed spaciousness
I have
been longing for
and not
the fearsome darkness
I have
been avoiding?
Or both.
What to Remember When Writing Poetry
- At January 02, 2021
- By drynick
- In Reflections
- 0
I’ve always wanted to be a poet and I suppose I am, because sometimes I write broken lines on the page and I find myself continually willing to step through the barrier of ‘Who do you think you are?’ to see what happens.
Words sometimes cohere like strange attractors to reveal patterns that bring me deeper. Finding some shape of sound and meaning that pleases me, I am send it off—post it as my gift to the universe. I suppose I should be more careful with creations. I should work longer to ensure only the highest quality. But I refuse to work that hard, so when there’s a spark, I trust that to be enough. (Even when there’s not a spark, I try to trust that too.)
For me, this trusting is the key to creating anything—remembering that there is nothing to prove, we are already OK. Since whatever we do will never be good enough to earn our keep, we don’t have to try so hard. It’s not not caring. It’s just remembering the beating heart has been given and already fills our entire body with the red elixir of life – the energy that sustains us – the life that is us. Whatever our considered opinion on the matter, we are always and nothing but the universe universing—the incarnation of God’s love.
The key to dancing (or writing poetry) in this life is to know that nothing could ever be good enough to earn this love that has already been given. As we consciously receive this unmerited gift of life, then we are free to take chances–to twirl and hop, to leap and stomp or to move so slow that everything appears to be still. Words come together (or not) and express some fraction of life. And that minuscule fraction manifests the fullness of the universe. Everything we do, every word we write, every move we make is our perfect love song to the mystery—a deep bow to all that is already.
So, under the cover of the darkness of January, take a chance! Write a poem, compose a song, draw a picture, make a collage of whatever images and words strike your fancy, glue a few random things together and call it a sculpture. Make something and see what it has to say to you.
Allow yourself to sing the song of your life out loud.
(Over the next two weeks, I will be interspersing some pieces from my archives as I devote part of my mornings to considering how (or whether) to manage everything I have written over the past year. The original version of this piece appeared 2/7/2017)
31 Prayers for January 2021
- At January 01, 2021
- By drynick
- In Reflections
- 0
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- May my thoughts, words and actions
align with the deeper love
that always sustains me. - May I freely offer all I have
in each moment
with no expectation of return. - May my feet be guided
by the immeasurable love
that fills universe. - May I dance freely
wherever I find myself. - May I laugh and cry
without restraint. - May I give myself away
in service of love,
again and again. - May I find
the courage to ask
for what I really want. - May I follow whatever is alive
with curiosity and irreverence. - May I be willing to be ridiculous
in service of awakening
all beings (including myself). - May I be
an instrument
of Peace. - May I delight in
small things. - May I be comfortable
being uncomfortable. - May I allow each person I encounter
to be who they already are and
may I learn what they have to teach me. - May I freely give
and freely receive. - May I treasure the rising
and the falling
of each moment. - May I fall down
to the earth
again and again. - May I be a comfort
to those around me. - May I be willing to disturb
those around me
in service of
awakening truth. - May I joyfully admit my mistakes
(even the small ones)
with embarrassment and humility. - May I delight in my accomplishments,
knowing they do not belong to me. - May I wander widely
and smile often. - May I never forget
how briefly
we are all here. - May I remember that
these are
‘the good old days’. - May I be foolish often
and apologize rarely. - May I learn
from all
my mistakes. - May I be ever braver and bolder.
- May my wisdom
and my blindness
lead others
to awakening. - May I continually abandon
all that comes
between me and Life. - May I serve Life
with joy and delight. - May I ask for help
and really mean it. - May the ten thousand
joys and sorrows of life
course through me
like a river in full flood.
- May my thoughts, words and actions
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All The Help I Can Get
- At December 31, 2020
- By drynick
- In Reflections
- 0
Last morning of the year. Cold rain falls outside in the darkness. Inside where I write from the warm comfort of my antique barkalounger, the Buddha and Bodhisattva statues gather in their usual silence on the bookcase next to me. They’ve been there so long, I rarely see them. It’s a cluttered arrangement with an old damaged enamel bowl, a small orange porcelain koi and a brass turtle spread throughout the convocation.
One of Bodhisattvas, Jizo, resides in a cup. Jizo is the guardian of travelers and the unborn. I wonder if his job has been easier this year with so few of us willing to travel? In his cup, he’s tilted a little, leaning against the side. He’s standing on some ashes. I like to think he’s watching over them. I’m not sure whether he’s protecting the ashes or me. His small stylized hands are in the prayer position and with his particularly round bald head he seems very serene. Just now, I straighten him up and I think he appreciates that.
Just next to him is a slightly smaller and much more delicate white porcelain statue of Kannon, the Bodhisattva of compassion. She is the one who hears the cries of the world. It is said that she responds immediately to each cry, though depending on the day, I might or might not be willing (or able) to stand by that statement.
As long as I can remember, calling out and hoping/waiting for a response has been a theme in my life. For some reason, calling out to something beyond has always made sense to me. I don’t remember ever struggling with the existence of God. I’m sure there is a God—some inconceivable source that goes by many names. My question has always been as to the nature of this being/force/principle that is beyond comprehension. I like the Jewish tradition of honoring the unimaginable quality of God by writing G-d instead of the full word.
And I have always loved the Psalms—these ancient songs of calling out. Calling out in both praise and lament. These human voices from so long ago have been companions and guides for me along my journey. They have made me feel less alone—have given me hope in dark places. Maybe, if we mush the traditions together for a moment, we could say that the Psalms are one of the voices of Jizo to the traveler. Of course, we are all travelers through this world of joy and sorrow. And we all need comfort.
Sometimes on especially dark mornings, lying in bed I put my hand on my cheek to reassure myself. ‘There, there sweetie,’ I say to myself, ‘everything will be OK.’ It’s kind of extraordinary how many days have, in fact, been OK. I might even say that since I’ve made it to this morning, the last one in 2020 that all the days since I tumbled, messy and helpless, out of my mother’s womb have been OK. And by OK I mean that all of the wonder, difficulty, dullness, excitement, anxiety, confusion and clarity that have filled them have led me to the next thing. I have not been abandoned to float through endless darkness and yet the ancient dread still arises.
And maybe even floating through endless darkness would be OK. I wonder what I might see or imagine as I floated through the dark universe. Maybe there are terrors and wonders to behold. Maybe I could just relax and enjoy the ride. Weightless and tumbling once again. I imagine myself as the astronaut in 2001: A Space Odyssey summersaulting over and over into the endless darkness. Only you can’t tumble over and over if every way is the same. With no gravity, everything is still. I would let it be still. I imagine. And Jizo and Kannon and G-d and the many other gods and Buddhas would accompany me. And they would be me. And that would be that.
But this morning—not yet. Apparently still more to come in the New Year. The good earth continues to hold and orient me with inescapable gravity. The breathing and the blood pumping and all that sustains me happens of its own, just as it has for the past sixty-eight years. And I continue to ponder the great matter—grateful for all the help I can get.
Follow David!