Crossing Nebraska

There were many itinerant teachers at the time of the Buddha, going village to village begging for alms, and providing teachings to those who would listen. Not surprisingly, they would often contradict each other, thus confusing the people and perhaps even causing them distress. After all, we don’t just want to be told pretty stories, we want to know what’s true. And so it was that the Kalamas of Kesaputta were hoping that the Buddha might ease their troubled minds: [They] said to the Blessed One, "Lord, there are some brahmans and contemplatives who come to Kesaputta. They expound and glorify their own doctrines, but as for the doctrines of others, they deprecate them, revile them, show contempt for them, and disparage them. And then other brahmans and contemplatives come to Kesaputta. They expound and glorify their own doctrines, but as for the doctrines of others, they deprecate them, revile them, show contempt for them, and disparage them. They leave us absolutely uncerta...

The most fundamental truth in all of Buddhism is that of the emptiness of all things. Enlightenment is the realization of this truth. Oh, but if only the depths of this reality were as easy to understand as to define! If the truth of emptiness ( sunyata ) were as easy to grasp as that of, say, 2+2=4, we wouldn’t need to speak in terms of enlightenment, or awakening ( bodhi ). It would be obvious to all but the least educated amongst us. But since the deepest understanding of emptiness is more akin to an understanding of Einstein’s theory of general relativity than simple arithmetic, we give it a special name. Just as we have a special name, of a sort, for those who understand relativity. Namely, genius! Indeed, some can speak intelligently about certain aspects of general relativity. Far fewer, though – even after a century of commentary, experimentation, study, and reflection – have grasped its intricacies. So groundbreakingly monumental was Einstein’s theory that whe...

I’ve been working on my house of late – replacing the siding, gutters, soffit & fascia, and so forth. It’s a big enough job that I dedicated a whole week of vacation just to getting it underway. Much still remains for me to do, but I’ve made fairly decent progress so far. And along the way I’ve had plenty of time to reflect upon what I’m doing, and why. Don’t I have enough to keep me busy without taking on such time-consuming and expensive chores? Of course, there are many ways I could answer that question: I’m increasing the resale value of my home. I’m staving off having to make more costly repairs in the future. I’m making my home as pleasing a place for me to live in as I can. I’m being a good neighbor by making my property as appealing to live next to as I can. I’m keeping my house from becoming one of those that just gets torn down upon resale so that another can be built in its place. Certainly everyone can relate to such motivations. We all understand the concept of be...

A new year begins, and with it I embark on a new journey born of renewed intention – even as the mud and memories of years gone by remain. The holiday season brought with it all the joy and sorrow of the karma that is mine; and now I live with the renewed intention that urged me to sit rohatsu sesshin at Sanshinji at the beginning of the last month of last year. Some days into that sesshin it began to snow. I walked in it one day after lunch, just as it was ceasing its accumulation. Here are some photographs of that walk, accompanied by the poetry that has been percolating somewhere in the back of my mind ever since: Walking In The Snow Walking in the snow is a meditation That unfolds of its own accord. If one must speak in terms of beginnings, Then it begins with the closing of the door behind us. And it ends when…, well…, Who can say when it ends?   A closing door, A garden fencerow – A walk in the snow quickly leaves such things behind. ...

Readers of Part 1 might find it interesting as they read on that my unconscious mind was able to construct a far more refined metaphor for practice than the “sitting with a belly full of crap” one that my conscious mind was able to come up with. As you may recall, “sitting with a belly full of crap” refers to the fact that so much of our lives is comprised of situations and circumstances that we would just as soon flush away, if only we could. However, as stated in Part 1 : “We can change our mind, we can even change our behavior; but the repercussions of our past mental and physical activity continue until such karma has been exhausted.” And so our practice becomes one of working with and working through our residual negative karma, all the while trying to refrain from creating such negativity anew. I had a dream one night during sesshin. It began with me flying over a very picturesque city – with many lakes and streams, beautiful buildings and walkways, lush foliage and green...

I said goodbye to my television a couple of weeks ago – a big old tube model that I’ve been carrying around from place to place since I first moved out on my own. It was a rather unceremonious ending for such a long-term relationship, I suppose, but it was also quite a long time in coming. I’ve been downsizing in general over the past couple of years and this was just one more step. And so it was that I woke up one Saturday morning with a little voice inside my head saying: “Oh yeah, you’ve been meaning to get rid of this haven’t you.” Off we went to Goodwill.     The thing about owning a television is that, whether or not it’s actually on, it tends to dictate what goes on around it. Whether it resides in your living room, family room, kitchen, or bedroom, it demands that people gather around it, and it insists that it be watched. When it happens to reside in the living room or family room, though, it has a way of becoming a veritable shrine to entertainment...

Leaves loosen their grip on life and become blown about by the wind. Trash by the roadside billows up and gets swept along in the wake of the traffic passing by. A tumbleweed bounces and rolls across the emptiness, only stopping when a tangle of brush or a fencerow rises up to halt its wandering. Things that are dead get blown by the wind, things with no mind of their own – lacking in intention. I remember watching the pollen from our backyard Chinese Mulberry seemingly explode into the sunlight to drift like fog upon the barely moving breeze. And the maple seeds… I’d watch them helicopter down from the tree tops, landing nearby or far away as the particularity of their structure and the movement of the air dictated. Yes, and I’ve come to learn that those “dead” tumbleweeds disperse their propagules as they go, or when they’re stopped by something rooted in moist and life-giving soil. Things that bear life get blown by the wind – things that carry in them the intention of somethin...

Please forgive me for straying so far from the usual rhythm of my posts. It’s been a busy spring so far! Yes, there’s been the usual pruning, transplanting, brush removal and garden preparation. Unfortunately, though, I’ve also had to cut down a forty foot tall bald cypress tree whose roots had breached the sewer line, causing it to clog and begin to buckle. It was difficult work, and solemn, too – both for the fact that it was dangerous for me, and for the fact that I was ending the life of something just as it was beginning to bud again.       Cutting short the life of anything is not something that I relish doing. I hope the tree forgives me, likewise the animals and humans that enjoyed its beauty, shade, and shelter. I’ve managed to forgive myself, I think, both for cutting the tree down now and for not being mindful enough regarding my choice of where to plant it in the first place. We can never count on being forgiven, though – at least we Buddhi...