One year in the OBW

One year ordained and I've already killed the teacher

It's been a year now since I was ordained in the OBW. The first months I tried to figure out what it meant and what I was going to do about it. People asked me if I was going to start a group or begin teaching in some way or other.

For some (most "zen" people) it was very difficult to understand that I wasn't a teacher until a student would recognize me as such. There was even one zenmonk that asked me how I should be "treated", throwing away with one question all her years of practice.

I didn't start any group, nor am I going to do it in the future. The fact is that I'm no teacher at all, I don't feel like one. What I do have been doing is writing with friends, sometimes meeting and talking. And this is something I consider very important, to have the oportunity of sharing a path and a practice that for me is the most important in this life.

It is in this sharing that the teacher can appear, only when we both are the students. As long as we can listen and give us to that listening, the teacher has a chance. Otherwise is just a name, a title, an empty word.

The breath, my other teacher

During this year I've also turned back to the practice on the breath. Doing an active work on it, one can easily find ease, comfort, joy and pleasure in sitting meditation, allowing so for longer meditation periods and a mind that is more receptive to explore body, feelings and ideas as they present themselves.

I know, many of you won't be happy to hear this, being so fond of non-doing. But I firmly believe in the process of construction that meditation is (one day I may explore how much construction is there in "emptiness", "non-doing" and "egolessness"). Maybe a quote of mister Gotama can help me here: "The path to freedom is a path of development and letting go"

Ending the year on retreat

Soon I'll be on my anual solitary retreat; think of me when you're celebrating Christmas, because I'll be doing jhana. This is the third year I'm allowed to do it in the same house, so it's turning a tradition now.

Finally, just let you know that my blog do jhana is back on track.

Whishing you all a peacefull end of the year.

Gassho

Friends of the Way

During my ordination ceremony so many things happened that I could barely follow what was going on. Five days later, I dare to have a look at the presents I received that day. Among them I found this poem.

I’ve always loved friends of the Way
Friends of the Way I’ve always held dear
Meeting a traveler with a silent spring
Or greeting a guest talking Zen
Talking of the unseen on a moonlit night
Searching for the Truth until dawn
When ten thousand reasons disappear
And we finally see who we are
Cold Mountain

Well, it actually says it all.

Finding a standpoint

I was talking to a dharma friend today. She guessed we were almost in the same standpoint regarding buddhism.

I immediately asked myself where my standplace was. When I first contacted the Boundless Way school I was making a slow attempt of transition from theravada to chan/zen. I didn't know if I would succeed and through this time I've been strongly based on the teachings of the Pali Canon. With time I've learnt to discuss, question and defend certain viewpoints, creating in this way a kind of identity, which as with all sense of identity is subject to decay and death.

Some place in the process I feel like I lost contact with something essential. Something I can only get in contact through abandoning what I've learnt, what I have, what I am... standing alone, naked and in silence, shading light into it until it reveals itself, wandering along, finding no standpoint, just as leaves do not say "my true nature is green" or "my true nature is yellow" in this boundless empty field.

It has nothing to do with buddhism or any other -ism. Becoming proficient in defending a certain view has nothing to do with it either. If it had, it would be like setting boundaries to the boundless. It cannot be done, no matter how hard one tries.

Seeking a home, seeking a refuge I was worried about where my standpoint was and thus my mouth was dry like a desert. My feet treading the boundless way, the sky as the limits of my head, where could worry find a standpoint?

the great way is gateless

The Great Way is gateless, approached by a thousand paths.
Pass trough this barrier, you walk freely in the universe.
Mumonkan

It is through Zen practice that we approach the gateless gate of our own self restricted minds. Every one of us is capable of accessing the boundless mind and passing freely through the mental barriers created by our fears and preconceptions. By letting go of our preconceptions, dualistic thinking and communal delusions, we discover the previously unrealized potential of our own unlimited consciousness and become self liberated. This is the fundamental tenet of Zen.

The Dojin Roku, translated into English as The Wayfarers Record, is a collection of thoughts, observations and shared teachings as presented by the Dojin, or Wayfarers, of the Boundless Mind Zen School. The purpose of this journal is to connect like minded individuals who understand their Zen practice to be a continuing journey beyond standardized Zen practices and independent of sectarian differences.

As of this writing, the Wayfarers of the Boundless Mind Zen School are in five countries and three continents and include individuals from various lineages and traditions who have come to find that the philosophy and practices of Boundless Mind Zen resonate with their own understanding of Zen. It is our intention to make these various thoughts, observations and teachings open to the world as part of the direct and free transmission of the Dharma.