Category: Zen
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Idle Blog
I had the idea of writing as practice when I started this blog. As you can see from the tiny number of posts it didn’t go according to plan. My enthusiasm wilted like late-sprouting seedlings under the heat of the July sun. In my case the sun is my endless self scrutiny, which continually casts…
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On Emptiness
Language and Buddhism, part 2 I mentioned in my first article on Language and Buddhism that looking at my English-based understanding of Buddhist concepts has been helpful to my practice. This article is a brief foray into Emptiness. Emptiness in English I’ve only had to wrestle with the word “emptiness” since I switched to Zen…
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Inside Out Perception
We are what we think.All that we are arises with our thoughts.With our thoughts we make the world. — The opening of the Dhammapada, translated by Thomas Byron I’ve been learning the modern neuroscience of perception and consciousness. It’s very different than the model I learned in grad school in the ’90s. For example, I…
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Non-seeking
This spring, after I thoroughly screwed up my lineage chart, Zen went empty. The lineage chart Last May, two of my sangha mates were receiving the precepts. As they handed in their rakusus and lineage charts, they chatted about how afraid they had been of making mistakes. It set the expectation in my mind that…
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Mu as a Null Pointer
Core dumped Mu! is the null pointerthat segfaults the mindas smoke drifts through the zendo. — EE Thompson Image of Reflection Model (Rashomon) by Takahiro Iwasaki Joshu’s Dog A monk asked Joshu, a Chinese Zen master: “Has a dog Buddha-nature or not?”Joshu answered: “Mu.” — Mumonkan #1, translation by Nyogen Senzaki and Paul Reps Joshu’s…
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Already There
Surely if I learned the intricacies of biophysics,making proteins dance inside a vast sea of transistors,I can learn the Buddhadharma. Surely if I transformed the silent beat of a conductor’s batoninto the audible, angular rhythms of the Rite of Spring,I can transform my mind. Surely if I found a barely marked campsitein the surreal, monochrome…
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Leaky Buckets
A few weeks ago though, Sensei told us the story of “No Water, No Moon” in a dharma talk about women in Zen. The story stuck with me because of the beautiful image of the moon reflected in the bottom of a pail. Yesterday in dokusan Sensei used a metaphor about filling a bucket; it…
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Escaping into Reddit
As I expand my Zen practice I’m taking time to look at my daily behavior. Lately I’ve found myself escaping into Reddit a lot. I’ve decided the solution is to collect my writing here instead. I’ve always liked message boards, going clear back to Usenet in the 1990s. Across decades of using them I’ve made…
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Zen and Running
I often listen to audio books or podcasts as I run. Lately I’ve been listening to Living Everyday Zen by Charlotte Joko Beck. The audiobook is a compilation of her dharma talks on many aspects of Zen practice. To my way of thinking, Beck is a hard-nosed teacher. She teaches incremental practice and largely avoids…
