I was taking pictures of my children playing with a huge yoga ball, when I accidentally snapped a picture of the ball in front of a Buddha statue I have in my yard. We know the cliché a picture is worth a thousand words, but in this case, the contrast between the serenity of the statue and the surrounding greenery with the incompatible and inharmonious blue ball inspired a thousand words. I guess that is what happens with the collision of two worlds.

I think I can explain why I appreciate Buddhism as a pearl of great price, by retelling a well-known story…

Once there was a woman, who as a child was orphaned and poor, but was eventually able to marry and begin a better life. However, as was the custom in those times, he status in her husband’s family depended on her having a son.

The title came from a lecture given by Adam Freeland (taken from the Nowism podcast from Zencast.org) in reference to that state of alert stillness… in touch with that primal energy of Being before it becomes beings.

It seems that just about every tradition describes this state as both primary origin and ultimate destination. In the Hebrew tradition, Adam, when originally created, was androgynous… a being in a state of innocence and simplicity. Adam was then separated into He and She, and together, they made more He’s and She’s. The Gnostic Christians talked of the ultimate as the union of this original male and female aspects, symbolized as marriage.

In Thich Nhat Hanh’s The Miracle of Mindfulness, he has a list of exercises to increase awareness of the present moment and to be more mindful. I thought of a version that worked well for me to realize that we are all interconnected.

Have a seat, and let’s begin, shall we? First, calmly take a few breaths and try to think of yourself sitting there. Now, pick your nose and fling a booger across the room…

On the last page of the latest issue of the Utne Reader, there is an article about Tony Deifell, a photographer who had a 12 year old ask him the question, “Why do you do what you do?” He found it more difficult to answer this to him than to the regular stream of people (read the article).

I suppose the most difficult person to answer this question to would be ourselves. So, in true Socratic form, this is a good question to regularly ask ourselves, and I thought that I would respond and explain myself… mainly to myself.

In listening to a collection of lectures by Thich Nhat Hanh called, The Art of Mindful Living, I came across this quote:

The present moment is made of the past.
The past is still alive in the present moment.

The first sentence is quite obvious, for wherever we are, it is because of a successive series of past events and choices. It is also the same with our perspective and mental outlook— I think the way I do because of my personal collection of experiences.

In the Fall 2004 issue of Tricycle, there is an interview with Robert Bellah, who was asked the following question:

Religious evolution is an area rife with controversy— Those who argue for an evolutionary view of religion often assume that newer is somehow better… Walk us through this minefield of ideas.

The other day, my wife called to me to come out in the backyard to see my Buddha wearing a “coon-skin hat.” When I came out, it did look like my Buddha was trying to be Davy Crockett, as there was a Red squirrel (tamiasciurus hudsonicus) perched on top of his head. The squirrel obviously enjoyed the viewed, as he was there long enough for me to go get my camera and return to take a number of pictures of him.

I put his large statue in the center of my garden to bring a sort of calmness to my thoughts— a message to be undisturbed in the midst of the swirling chaos I call my life. How could one be more undisturbed than to let a squirrel squat on your head?

To be completely honest, when I placed this statue in my garden, I fully expected to spend a lot of time giving Buddha a shampoo to get the bird crap out. But surprisingly, the birds have had quite a bit of respect for him. Either that, or there are just so many other targets around. But for all the time this squirrel roosted there, he didn’t poop on him either.

That’s nice of wildlife, not to shit on what we like.

Ran across an interesting interview with the Dalai Lama by James Beverley (courtesy of Brent Simon). The interview was quite interesting, and primarily focused his views of Christianity. After saying that Buddhism was the best choice for himself, he states:

“This does not mean Buddhism is best for everyone. No,” he said when pushed further. “Now, for my Christian brother or sister, Christianity is best for him or for her.” But Christianity, he said, is not the best for him. “Here, the concept of one religion, one truth, is very relevant for the individual,” he said, qualifying his other statements about one religion. “But for the community it must be several truths, several religions.”

We spend our lives enjoying one psychological attack after another. One of the more disturbing is the fact that reality just isn’t real. Every now and then the fabric of reality ripples with an unfelt breeze.

But we can’t prove it. Reality is nothing more than a nagging doubt. In a way, it would be nice if the fabric would just rip, so that we can say, “Ah ha!” and deal with that fact. But at least for me, I’m no Neo, and reality does a pretty good job of maintaining its perception of completeness— of realness. But let’s get back to this idea of rippling it…

Years ago, I mentioned my thoughts on the need to leave your spiritual traditions for a new path. While not every one needs to follow this Abrahamic precedence, but some do. Some of us never completely leave, and just add a few things from other traditions. Still others leave, but spend their time wandering from path to path, never getting very deep into anything for any length of time.

Anyway, I ran into this quote by James Shaheen, editor for Tricycle, in the Fall 2003 issue:

Doesn’t it make sense for one to venture outside one’s own tradition if meaning is to be found there? Perhaps the question is moot, since so many Westerners cherry-pick their way through traditions anyway. And, as a Therevadan monk commented to me not long ago, “Rumi is everybody’s favorite Buddhist poet nowadays.”

Came across the following quote in Shunryu Suzuki’s book, Not Always So (page 113), where he says:

Let things work as they do… Real practice has orientation or direction, but it has no purpose or gaining idea, so it can include everything that comes. Whether it is good or bad doesn’t matter.

While he is specifically referring to Zen Buddhism, it seems that if you take the word practice in a general sense, it contains a very interesting idea.

Ran across the following quote by Ezra Bayda in his article, So How Do We Begin to Live Genuinely? in the July 2003 issue of Shambhala Sun (page 37):

When we see that we’re sleep, we might think we have to make superhuman efforts to wake up. We might look for technique after technique, or for more and more words of wisdom—but neither approach will give us the solution that we’re looking for, especially if we fall into then trap of trying to fix or change ourselves. Genuine spirtual pracitce is never about fixing ourselves, because we’re not broken. It’s about becoming awake to who we really are, to the vastness of our true nature, which includes even the parts of ourselves we label as “bad.”

Seems odd that as I sometimes fall asleep while sitting, I’m sitting just to wake up.

Here I sit, looking out my front window with a cup of tea in my hand. I see a beautiful bluejay swoop out of a tree in that characteristic ‘W’ flight pattern and perch itself a few feet away. “What a beautiful bird,” I think … at least, I think this until it opens its mouth to release the most awful sound… a sound that is a blend of a primeval scream and an annoying shriek.

Think it is just coincidence that the word banshee and blue jay both start with the letter ‘B’? I think not.

Now, I realize that despite what some people may say, a bluejay’s features were not designed for my pleasure or entertainment… or even my “benefit and use”, but it is surprising that such a pretty bird can make such a hellish sound.

Came across an interesting concept in Shunryu Suzuki’s book, Not Always So (page 86), where he says:

When you observe without trying to observe, that is true observation.

But actually, that is not what he wrote. This is just my adaptation of his idea (I’ll give you the entire quote in a second). It occurred to me that trying to observe your mind is similar to Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle that by trying to observe, you actually change the nature of what you are observing.

Buddhism is one of those things that when introduced to a unfamiliar Western student comes across as almost baffling. And my “summary” changes over time the more I study it. Today, I came across my favorite summary to date, from Shunryu Suzuki’s Not Always So (page 81):

While I generally sport facial hair, I’m not one to just let it be. You can’t even if you wanted because … well, its hair and its always changing. So I entertain myself by growing it out in the winter (nothing like a sock on your face when the wind is whipping) and start to trim it down in various patterns until it drops off completely in the summer.

Yeah, I know you are utterly fascinated. I have a point, though.

Got another fabu quote from Shunryu Suzuki in his Not Necessarily So book, and thought I’d mention it here (page 77):

Our aim is to have complete experience or full feeling in each moment of practice. What we teach is that enlightenment and practice are one, but my practice was what we call stepladder Zen: “I understand this much now, and next year,” I thought, “I will understand a little bit more.” That kind of practice doesn’t make much sense—I could never be satisfied. If you try stepladder practice, maybe you too will realize that it is a mistake.

I don’t know whether it is just my state of mood or what, but sometimes I just want to quote Suzuki’s Not Always So in its entirety here. Today, I came across the following quote (page 78):

Do not count your breaths just to avoid your thinking mind but to take the best care of your breathing.

Wait a freakin’ minute! Isn’t this exactly what I’ve been trying to do? Clearly this is one of those Zen koans that I need to stew in …

While I was walking the streets of my little town, I was noticing some of the features that don’t appeal to me. I’m sure everyone sees the same problems, but they must not be enough of a problem for someone to work to fix it.

For some odd reason, I thought that if this were a MUD, then I would just give myself a bit of mojo and retype in the description to make things a little cleaner … a little nicer.

So the other day, while sitting perched atop a cushion, I was distracted by the fact that I realized that my mind had not generated a distraction for me.

<sigh> sheesh </sigh>

Why do we sit? I’ve sat for years with different styles, but after reading Living by Zen (by D.T. Suzuki), I sat with the idea of finding satori (enlightenment). But later, when I read Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind (by Shunryu Suzuki … no relation), he said to not worry about attaining enlightenment, but just to sit. Quote: “You do not meditate to gain enlightenment, you meditate because you are enlightened” (see my other thoughts).

Found another great quote by Shunryu Suzuki in his book, Not Always So (page 56-57):

I noticed on my father-in-laws copy of Time Magazine that the cover had the beautiful actress, Heather Graham, in the classic meditation pose with the caption, The Science of Meditation. I mean, who wouldn’t want to meditation if that is how good you can look (I guess you can actually read the articles).

Just read a very thought provoking chapter in Shunryu Suzuki’s Not Always So, and thought I would mention a bit. Let’s start with a quote (from page 42 if you want to follow along):

“What is your practice? What is Buddha?” somone asked [Zen master Ummon]. He answered … “Something to wipe yourself with in the rest room.” That is what he said. And since then many Zen masters are thinking about it, practicing with the koan: What is toilet paper?

"A tiger catches a mouse with his whole strength." is quoted by Shunryu Suzuki in Not Always So (he attributes it to Tatsugami Roshi), and this quote got me thinking that meditation is a concerted effort. Funny … as an outside observer, It appears quite peaceful, restful … almost sleepy, but you can't read a single thing about meditation that begins with the words, just relax. Of course, while reading my website, I'm sure you can hear in the back of your mind, "You're getting sleepy..."

I just watched Scientific American Frontiers episode, entitled, Worried Sick. The idea was to show what a lot of us had known for quite some time: that meditation was good for you in more ways than one … in this case, for stress release.

When my two year old daughter asks me to draw a “duhk” or puts her little hand up to her nose and says “whoo” … it isn’t just the duck or elephant she wants me to draw. It is something more and something less than this. For a soon as I’ve completed (and sometimes she doesn’t even wait for the final product), she scribbles over it so that you can’t see the completed masterpiece or she just erases it entirely.

Today while listening to a few CDs my sister lent me, I was caught by some of the lyrics. Granted, I don't listen to female angst artists, but they often have great poetic lyrics. Anyway, the lyrics that jarred me were from Beth Orton's Central Reservation (from the album of the same name).

Read an interesting article in Shambhala Sun called, The Lama in the Lab by Daniel Goleman, about a more empirical approach to the benefits of meditation (which was interesting in itself), I came across a fabulous quote by the Dalai Lama:

I'm not thinking how to further Buddhism, but how the Buddhist tradition can make some contribution to the benefit of society.

I guess it was a month or so ago when I noticed an extremely dry patch of skin on the top of one of my feet where the ankle and foot join. I've had various weird skin conditions for most of my life, and since it was irritating, I didn't worry too much about it ... until I realized that it was a callous ... a callous caused by my meditation posture.

I think that one of the greatest sources of stress that we heap on ourselves comes when we compare the potential we had when we were teenagers with what we have become. Granted, we did have lots of potential, but we made choices, because … well, you can't have it all. Choosing one opportunity over another means you lost one opportunity. To retrofit an old quote:

No matter what choices you've made, here you are.

In finishing up the January issue of Shambhala Sun, in the back is an article that surprised and pleased me. I didn’t expect an article that discussed a subject that I had always labeled as pagan in a magazine that I would label as Buddhist. But the concept of a “shrine” is pretty common to lots of traditions.

Read an interesting article this morning in the January 2003 issue of Shambhala Sun entitled, To Touch Enlightenment with the Body by Reginald A. Ray. He talks about an experience he had while trying to meditate with all of the aches and pain from his body trying to distract him. This, he said, inflamed his mind even more to the point where the pain in the body and the pain in his mind was like “a nuclear reactor that had attained critical mass and was about to explode.”

I am a computer programmer by trade, and so my thoughts on the nature of ourselves is tainted by this perspective. I see our physical bodies like computer hardware … they don't do much by themselves except get out-of-date. That activity in our frontal-lobes that controls a good chunk of our conscious decisions and thoughts (known elsewhere as our soul or spirit) is the software. This software doesn't work well without a host body. The electricity that fuels this beast is what we call life, and I'm not sure I completely understand where this energy comes from, I sure do appreciate it.

Read an article this morning in Shambhala Sun (September 2002) by Bhante Henepola Gunaratana entitled Why Meditate. The pronouciation of his name notwithstanding, the article was one of the best explanations of meditation I've read. His premise is that you can not "move on" until you have thoroughly looked at yourself. Here is my favorite quote:

Somewhere in this process [of meditation], you will come face to face with the sudden and shocking realization that you are completely crazy. Your mind is a shrieking, gibbering madhouse on wheels barreling pell-mell down the hill, utterly out of control and hopeless.

No problem.

You are not crazier than you were yesterday. It has always been this way, and you just never noticed. You are also no crazier than everybody else around you. The only real difference is that you have confronted the situation; they have not.

In an article by Thich Nhat Hanh (Summer 2002 issue of Shambhala Sun), he recites a teaching of the Buddha:

My teachings are a finger pointing to the moon. Do not get caught in thinking that the finger is the moon. It is becuase of the finger that you can see the moon.

To paraphrase this article, it seems to me that Buddhism is good at pointing out the delusions in our life, but can not explain the truth … but this is because the truth can not be explained. It is ineffable. It must be discovered by each of us individually. And the tools of any religion are really just tools to get us to the discovery. Too often we get caught up in the tools.

I picked up the September 2002 issue of Shambhala Sun (a Buddhist magazine) and read the initial editorial from the Editor, Melvin McLeod, where he says:

Throughout this issue, the message is: you can't pretend. The spiritual path, if genuine, is never based on pretending you're someone you're not, dreaming about the person you might become, or projecting some fantasy on a spiritual teacher.

This morning on the bus, I started reading an article from Tricycle (Summer 2002) called, "What Name did Buddha Give His Son?" Where a father asks his daughter that question. The girl answered, "Get-in-the-way." (The correct answer was hinderance, but that was close enough). He goes on to say:

The bald fact of the matter is that children do get in the way of monastic practice. How could it be otherwise? Monastic practice must be done with single-minded devotion. Parenting is the same. Those people who think you can have both, it seems to me, must either not be very good parents or not very good monks—or possibly both. That is why the Buddha abandoned his son. It just doesn't work.

Read an article by Thomas Moore (author of Care of the Soul) in this quarters issue of Tricycle (Summer 2002) entitled, Zen Catholic.

While I haven't read his book, I have read a couple of his other articles (one was in Parabola) and I know a little bit about this man. He lived as a Catholic monk but has been influenced by Zen writings and this article explained the interplay between his Catholicism and his Zen Buddhism.

In the latest issue of Tricycle magazine (Summer 2002), I read an interview with a Zen teacher, Barbara Rhodes. Found a great little quote that she said in response to the question, "Where does that question (What am I?) lead one?"

It leads you right to this moment. That's what's revealing. A teaching term we use is that you have "enough mind." If you're in this room now, it means you're completely taking in this room, this situation, and it's enough. As your wisdom grows you attain "enough mind," and that's how you know where to step next. So asking, "What am I?" develops the state of mind in which everything is enough. You don't wish you were somewhere else, or someone else, doing something else. You learn to be with each moment, to do what's in front of you, and that it's enough, however difficult the situation.

An article in this issue of Tricycle (Spring 2002) brought up two wonderful thoughts. The first one, I have already mentioned earlier. This second one has dropped me into a cup of thoughts ...

My current religious thinking is not appropriate for children. I want to tackle the complexities and mystery of life, both the importance and irrelevance of the world, and the truths and paradoxes in my head. But the world I want to build around my child is a world of absolutes, of safety, of certainty. A world without fear ...

Read an article on how religions and religious leaders (specifically Buddhist monks) are trying to move into the Internet space as a way to "spread the message." I'd doubt they'd ever catch up to the number of Fundamentalist Christian and Wiccan websites. But it seems to me that some religions, especially Zen Buddhism, is very guru/student oriented. Can online chatting with a master hold the same life-changing potential?

Have you ever read something so wonderful, so "in the moment" that you feel like you've never read anything else before? That's what I thought with a particular article in the Spring 2002 issue of Tricycle, One Chance, One Encounter by Soko Morinaga Roshi. I thought I would type in a quote or two, but I find that I keep typing …

I’ve been enjoying Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Shunryu Suzuki and thought I’d copy down an interesting quote (and my thoughts about it) and put them up here.

I need some help interpreting the following two poems. Both of them are from Stonehouse, that Chinese Zen monk that I've been mentioning. You know, the one that lived as a recluse in a hut in the mountains during his "retirement" years.

I don't understand koans and I'm not sure if I've reached satori, but I sure do love the poetry written by Zen masters and monks. Lately, I've been reading the poetry of a Zen monk named Stonehouse (translated by Red Pine). I thought I would just share some of my favorites.

I clipped this quote from a web site that was quoting my favorite Zen writers, D. T. Suzuki. It began with the following exchange between a mother and child:

"Where did you go?"
"Out."
"What did you do?"
"Nothing."

Now that I've installed my RealAudio driver on my Ultrasparc, I've been listening to lots of Phish and Little Feat bootlegs ... but one thing that I found was an interview with Trey Anastasio and Mike Gordon (members of the band, Phish) and he talked quite a bit about how he and the members of his band are not the originators of the music, but only channelers.

I wrote the following email to a friend of mine:

Lately, I've been "running across" comments about "loosing one's ego" (part of the Buddhist philosophy we were talking about today), and ran across the following message in a very long thread in the Phish newsgroup … thought you'd be interested in this.