I've started writing the story of meditation practice in my life,
staring with the childhood questions that got me interested in
meditation, through years with Swami Muktananda and Gurumayi
Chidvilasananda in the Siddha Yoga organization, through drug
experiences, and my current practice style with the Kwan Um School of
Zen, founded by Zen Master Seung Sahn (aka Dae Soen Sa Nim).

My intention is to hear from anyone else who'd like to talk about how
meditation practice connects with their life, or about life
experience
that led them through one style of practice to another. The first 3
chapters of my story are posted at my blog, http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/

I'll post individual chapters here also, and welcome anyone who's
willing to chime in with their own stories or thoughts or
perspectives, either here or in my blog's comments section.

Here's Chapter One:

Grand disclaimer: If there's anything I've learned from my life and
practice, it's that how I keep my mind just now, my own thinking, has
remarkable effects; it's powerfully and intimately connected with
everything. When I blog about Yoga, Zen, or American culture, what I
say is at least as much about my personal mind-state as I travel
through these worlds, as it is about any external traditions. Since
we
share so much as human beings, I hope that there are others who can
relate to these personal mind-states.

My original practice style was ordinary American life. I grew up in a
secular Jewish, upwardly mobile middle class family, 2 generations
removed from Ukrainian immigrants between the wars. The ethics I
absorbed from this upbringing - to honor the Golden Rule and try to
not hurt anyone - have worked out fine.

satisfaction when looking for a big-picture goal or life direction.
Mostly it seemed that people lived for the sake of getting nice
things, situations, relationships, etc. All that's fine, but a bit
thin, in the face of the great mystery of existence that was staring
me in the face.

I didn't quite have words to express the vastness of the mystery I'd
been sensing since the beginning. Years later, I encountered iconic
philosopher/scientist Gottfried Leibniz asking "Why is there
something
rather than nothing?" and I felt an inner, "Yeah, that's what I've
been wondering!" But as a child, I got hardly any support for
engaging
my big questions. No one else seemed to consider them very important,
so I put them on the back burner till my late teens.

I'll mention tangentially that my family did seem to have goals and
direction that worked for them, but I couldn't quite relate. My
parents considered it of utmost importance to raise a family, to
leave
a mark on the world beyond their own lifespan. OK, but isn't that
just
postponing the inevitable? Maybe leaving descendents means you "live
on" after your individual body dies... but before too long, the sun
will explode or something and the planet will get burnt to a crisp.
Let's not be dishonest by pretending that there's any way to avoid
total extinction.

Similarly, my parents cared about being part of the continuing story
of the Jewish People. That has even less resonance for me. Even if my
grandfather's grandfather wore a certain type of hat and sang songs
in
a strange language, where was the meaning of doing the same things
myself?

In college I naturally gravitated toward Psychology, Philosophy, and
Religious Studies. That was something; it was cool to read the great
Western philosophers express my mystery in clearer language, and
especially cool to realize that people who asked my big questions
were
taken seriously in this world. But my professors themselves didn't
seem to spend much time and energy looking into the nature of the
self
and all that. They seemed to think the pursuit of these issues ran
into a dead end centuries ago (Leibnitz died in early 1700s), and the
profs spent their days trying to get published papers that quibbled
about linguistic nuances. Any academic pursuit of Truth still felt
terribly lacking.

I was 18, a freshman at Yale, when I encountered Swami Muktananda and
his "Siddha Yoga (SYDA)" organization and community. One big pull was
finally connecting with people who took the big questions of
existence
seriously, seriously enough to affect their lives.

Honest to God, I'm trying to be brief here. But the arc of my
practice
kinda encompasses my whole life; this story may take a couple more
postings to get through. Next time I'll blog about the plusses and
minuses of my time in Yoga ashrams, how I eventually left the
ashrams,
encountered Zen, and how a week-long Zen retreat profoundly affected
my perspective on the whole journey.

**********
Stuart
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/socalled.htm

This is the 2nd chapter of the story of my life and meditation
practices, which I've been writing in installments on my blog at
http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/

As always, I'd be real interested in hearing from anyone out there
who's been involved with different styles of meditation practices and
would like to chime in with their own experiences, or with any
different perspectives on what I write about.

Here's Chapter 2:

The previous blog entry describes my practice/life through my freshman
year in college, 1977/78, when I encountered guru Swami Muktananda and
his "Siddha Yoga" (SYDA) organization. He inspired me to give up
ordinary-American style. I quit school, worked and saved for months,
and started living in Siddha Yoga ashrams, joining Muktananda's "3rd
World Tour" by early 1979.

Today, as I progress into deep middle-age, it's difficult to keep all
these memories organized. In this case, though, I'm certain of the
date. The first ashram I lived in was Oakland, CA, a stop on
Muktananda's Tour. After 2 months, I returned to see my parents near
Philadelphia, PA. I recall my nervousness when flying back East,
because the accident at Three Mile Island had just exploded. So I have
a reliable time-stamp for my story at this point. We may assume that
it's pure coincidence that my years with Muktananda started with a
nuclear melt-down.

Anyway: the great lesson I learned from Muktananda is that my
thinking, what's going on in my mind just now, is incredibly,
amazingly powerful. Attending to how I keep my mind moment-to-moment
can be a more interesting, rewarding, and efficient life direction
than trying to get or control anything in the external world. In order
to comprehend and experience the power of mind, it's necessary to take
a pause, slow down, and observe this inner world with care and energy.
That is: this 5 year period in SYDA ashrams was when I began to do
formal meditation practices.

It's hard to break the habit of always focusing on the world of stuff,
always striving to get stuff. Looking at thought-patterns is usually
more difficult than distracting myself from them. Even the act of
sitting still for long periods is itself physically painful. There are
major hurdles to overcome in starting a meditation practice. My ashram
situation helped me through this in a number of ways.

I had the support of the large group that lived and practiced together
(human beings are herding animals more than we realize). I adopted the
belief-system that Muktananda was on a higher, spiritual level than
ordinary people, so I could believe him when he told me that
meditation was special and holy, that it would bring me to God, to
enlightenment, and all that. I got lots of great, euphoric feelings
from the practices, and from focusing on the guru. The community, the
hope and desire to climb the spiritual ladder, and the good feelings
inside kept me going.

And I liked the philosophy. I liked remembering that It's All One.
Just as gold can be fashioned into different types of jewelry and
still be the same gold, all things in the world are in fact the same
substance: God or Self or Absolute. This understanding freed me from
clinging to particular things, people, or situations. If it's all God,
then wherever I go, whatever I do, whatever happens is OK. Following
this understanding, after 2.5 years in American ashrams, I moved to
the main ashram in India, effectively renouncing everything from my
previous life.

I was there when Muktananda died; it didn't bother me at all. By that
point, I was really interested in exploring truth for myself, not so
much in devotion to a guru. Sure, in the early years, it gave me
energy to believe in god-like super-beings. Eventually, all that
seemed cultish. I'd prefer to take my understanding and my meditation
practice and run.

But on the other hand... everyone around me believed in the magical
power that emanated from the guru, a power most concentrated in his
physical presence, a power that'd exponentially quicken my ascent to
enlightenment or whatever. What if they were right? It'd be stupid to
give that up, and I didn't want to be stupid. Muktananda had left
successor gurus, so for a year after his death, I remained with them
in the India ashram, uncertain about giving up my connection to the
special power that was (maybe?) dependent on holy people and places.

Ultimately, I decided that I wanted to believe in myself. I preferred
having a scientific mind that openly questioned everything, rather
than believing in magical invisible energy, in Gods, in holy
enlightened beings. I was tired of believing in things because other
people did, or because some authority told me to, or because some old
and popular book said so. If I could get enlightenment in a year by
believing in a guru, or in 1000 lifetimes by believing in myself, I'd
still prefer to believe in myself. What's the hurry anyway?

So I left India in early 1984, figuring I'd go back the good old USA,
where people are skeptical and cynical and don't believe in any
folktale that sounds nice. My kind of people! I'd find some simple
life to sustain myself, continue to meditate, to train my mind to be
quiet and focused, and use my remembrance of Oneness to remain as a
witness. Whatever would appear in the real world, I'd watch it unfold
as if a movie.

In the course of finding an ordinary life situation, I ended up in
California by 1985. I had my first encounters with Zen teaching and
with psychedelic experiences, which jolted me into a new direction and
new understandings (or perhaps a lack thereof). Details to come in my
next blog entry.

Stuart
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/socalled.htm

This is the 3rd chapter of the story of my life and meditation
practices, which I've been writing in installments on my blog at
http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/

My previous blog entry ended with my return, in 1984, to the USA after
5 years in Siddha Yoga ashrams, the last 2+ in India. This blog entry
and maybe a couple more will take me through my first Zen retreat in
early 1988.

I had gone from my family's house to college to ashram, and now at 25,
I was ready to begin the practice of being an independent adult. My
grandmother had died during my ashram years, and I had a few thousand
dollars she'd left me. I'd use it to start a new life in California.
I'd grown up in the East Coast during the 70s, old enough to
understand the hippies and the counter-culture and the Grateful Dead
and all, but too young to participate. Like so many people, I felt a
pull to California as a place for a fresh beginning.

I connected with a friend I'd met in India, and we hit the road. (Some
adventures we had during this period are on my Strange Trips web page
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/trips.htm ) I ended up first in the
Los Angeles area, then in Arcata, and finally in Berkeley (which had
seemed alluring ever since my months in the Oakland ashram in '79). In
various places, I did temp jobs to get by.

I had one year of college and no particular skills. I saw lots of
office jobs available, but they required decent typing skills. I got
an old typewriter and began to practice typing out newspaper articles
for hours. It seemed impossible. How in the world was I to remember
where all the letters were? But incredibly, after a few weeks of this,
my fingers began to automatically know what to do. The power of
practice never ceases to amaze me.

In my temp typing jobs, I was usually in front of a computer, and
there was plenty of time when the workload was slow, so step-by-step I
taught myself word processing, then spreadsheet design and
programming. I learned how to support myself and take care of my own
life, and these life lessons were as rich as those I'd gotten from
philosophy and meditation. Learning how to survive and make a living
didn't feel separate or inferior to explicitly spiritual pursuits.

Life has its ups and downs, successes and failures. I had the usual
succession of joy and depression and comfort and anxiety. I kept up
with my formal and informal meditation practice. I'd practice
attention to the moment, repeating a mantra, sitting still, watching
my breath, and remembering that it's all One. Whatever attachments or
desires or entanglements appeared in my mind, I had this practice of
returning to witness-consciousness, making it all OK. I didn't know
what, if anything, I should do more or different with these practices.

During this time, news filtered through to me about goings-on in the
ashram world. Muktananda's successors, a brother and sister guru team,
had broken apart in a bitter sibling rivalry, filled with lies and
violence. The sister (Gurumayi Chidvilasananda) sent out mud-slinging
letters against her brother rival (Gurudev Nityananda), even going so
far as sending goons to physically attack and threaten those who
attended his programs.

The SYDA antics sounded so silly, and removed any lingering allegiance
I felt to that group. While I'd always enjoy visiting and exploring
different groups out of curiosity or entertainment, I saw no need to
be part of a group. No guru or group held the magic or secret. I
figured all that any teacher or group could do was lead me to the type
of meditation practice and understanding I already had.

I was in contact with E, an old friend from my year at Yale. He was
the one friend back then who'd joined me in learning to meditate and
going to Siddha Yoga ashrams. We'd both been influenced at the time by
reading Ram Dass and similar books. Our minds had been opened to wider
possibilities by taking LSD, though that was just one low-dosage trip;
my more high-powered drug trips would come later.

E had since become a monk in the Korean-style Zen school founded by
Zen Master Seung Sahn (ZMSS). He'd written me while I was still in
India, and seemed enthusiastic for me to try Zen teaching and
practice.

I couldn't understand why E found Zen worth exploring. I told him that
Zen seemed just like Siddha Yoga. The differences were superficial: a
different language to chant in, a different posture to sit in, and a
different statue on the altar. The actual practice of watching and
quieting the mind, of returning to the witness that saw everything as
one, was the real point; why care about any particular tradition? E
said to me, "It doesn't matter if you do Yoga meditation or Zen
meditation or Christian meditation or any other kind. But it's very
important to look into WHY you meditate." Hmmmm.

E's words caught my interest a little, but it was more powerful when I
saw him demonstrate them. I went to visit him in L.A. where he was
staying at a Zen Center with ZMSS. E would soon go to Korea for an
extended time, and I wanted to see him before he left. Coincidentally,
Gurumayi was on tour at the L.A. Siddha Yoga ashram at the same time.

The first night I was there, E said to me, "I've got a great idea. Why
don't we get up early tomorrow, do Zen practice first, then go to the
program at the Siddha Yoga ashram." I didn't see any point to it. All
these practices were fundamentally the same, what difference did it
make if we went to one or the other or both? But, whatever, I'd go
along with him.

At the ashram, as we did the Siddha Yoga chants and practices,
including going up to bow to the guru, I kept watching E, waiting for
him to say or do something to try to convince me that Zen had
something better than Siddha Yoga. But he didn't show any difference.
At the Zen center, he just followed the Zen forms; at the Siddha Yoga
ashram, he just did the practices there like everyone else. The way he
just did both practices, without offering any opinions about them... it
made an impression on me. His attitude of just following each
situation was a teaching that couldn't have been expressed with just
words.

Even though I saw all traditions as the same, there was a particular
reason that I wanted to avoid Zen. I knew that part of that tradition
was being confronted with very difficult questions from the Zen
Master. I'm a shy person. I didn't want to get involved in any fierce
debates. I preferred being a still and silent witness.

But there we were later in the day, driving through L.A. on some
errand. E was driving, next to him in the front seat was ZMSS, and I
was in the back. I really wanted to avoid any sort of interaction with
this Zen Master. I figured if I just stayed quiet, he wouldn't bother
me. It wasn't like I'd ever asked him for teaching, after all.

E was telling ZMSS that the two of us first got interested in
meditation back in college when we'd taken LSD. "Yes," ZMSS offered,
"sometimes when a person takes LSD, he sees that everything is
changing, changing, changing, and he understands that attachment isn't
so good."

E continued, "And after LSD, we started doing Yoga-style meditation."
Without looking back at me, ZMSS asked, "So, how long have you been
doing Yoga?"

Crap. I didn't want to get involved with any convoluted Zen dialog.
But it was a moving car; I had no escape. "I've been meditating for 7
years or so," I told him.

"After doing Yoga for so long," he asked, "have you gotten anything?"

It was a big question, and maybe a good cliffhanger. In my next blog,
I'll complete this conversation, and tell how it led to me looking
into ZMSS's teachings, and eventually to an astounding week doing a
formal sitting retreat with him.

Stuart
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/socalled.htm

Thanks, Roky. I think it was around March 1979 that I spent 2 months
there. That was when the crowds and chaos of Muktananda's "3rd World
Tour" had taken over the ashram. I haven't been there in a decade I
guess. I still pass by on my bike sometimes. I know they used to have
chanting nights etc open to the public, I haven't looked into it in a
long time.

If you're open to writing any details about the ashram was like for
you, or how you carried on when you left etc, please consider posting
here, or on my blog.

Stuart
http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/

This is the 4th chapter of the story of my life and meditation
practices, which I've been writing in installments on my blog at
http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/

In the previous chapter, our hero found himself in a moving vehicle
with famed Korean Zen Master Seung Sahn (whom I'll abbreviate as ZMSS,
and was commonly addressed during his life as "Dae Soen Sa Nim"). ZMSS
taught in a tradition that uses difficult, piercing questions, and I'd
reluctantly been drawn into a dialog with him that went like this:

*****

ZMSS: How long have you been doing Yoga?

Me: I've been meditating for about 7 years.

ZMSS: After doing Yoga for so long, have you gotten anything?

Me: Yeah, sure.

ZMSS: What have you gotten?

Me: My mind used to give me lots of problems, but as I meditate more,
it gives me fewer problems.

ZMSS: If mind is such a problem, why do you make "mind"?

Me: Thinking just appears on its own.

ZMSS: Thinking is no problem; it's like clouds passing through the
sky. But if you attach to thinking, you make a mind, and that's a big
problem. So when you're doing something, just do it! Don't make
"mind." That's true Yoga. OK?

*****

What was that about? "Just do it"? This guy was supposed to be some
extraordinary Master. How could he get away with a teaching that said
so damn little?

My apartment in Berkeley was coincidentally just a few blocks away
from one of the handful of Zen Centers that ZMSS had established
around the world. I visited a few times to hear talks by other
teachers that ZMSS had authorized, and to read from a couple of his
books.

The teaching was always so simple, it was practically invisible. Human
beings enter the ocean of suffering when we make something, i.e., when
we attach to I/my/me-thinking like "I like/dislike something," "I want
to get something," etc. But our original, before-thinking mind always
shines purely, like empty space, or a clear mirror. Red appears, and
this mirror-mind only reflects red. White appears, only white.

Simplicity shouldn't have bothered me. By my latter days in India, I'd
already been pondering how sometimes my spiritual efforts seemed like
building a house, by acquiring and stacking together special
experiences and understandings. I'd decided that I really needed to do
the opposite, to metaphorically tear down that building by throwing
away whatever ideas I found myself clinging to.

But still... I guess I'd been holding out hope that as I kept
returning to witness-consciousness, it'd eventually lead me to some
lasting, substantial attainment. Famous teachers I'd read, like Ramana
Maharishi, had spoken about a permanent attainment, enlightenment or
self-realization or some such. I think Ramana had said it was like our
self-effort was necessary to keep us bobbing on the surface of the
ocean, not drowning in the world. All we could or should do is to
patiently continue our efforts till God would swoop down and take us
the rest of the way. Did I really need to give up all hope of this
"enlightenment," and be left with nothing but "just do it"?

Sometime around then I got introduced to a guy who hung out in
People's Park selling LSD. I'd had one acid trip in college, but years
later, when I described it to an old hippie, she told me, "If your ego
didn't completely disappear, you need a bigger dose." True enough.

When I was around 7 years old, a light bulb burned out in our house,
and my parents removed it, but didn't have a replacement. For many
days I walked past that empty socket, till I finally flicked the
switch on and stuck my finger in. It was an awful, frightening,
painful few seconds till I managed to pull my finger back out (hence
my continued survival). Thing is, in those days leading up to my
shocking experience, I may have pondered about when and how I'd stick
my finger in that socket, but I never seriously considered not doing
it at all. That's my particular mind, or karma; it's just
inconceivable to let an opportunity like that pass by.

I took 3 hits of the acid. During the first hour or so, there were
some frightening moments, as I/my/me disappeared 90% or 99% and I
desperately worried about losing the rest. But then it indeed
disappeared completely, and remained that way for hours. The world was
revealed as harmless, dream-like mind-stuff. The distinction between
"I" and "this" was revealed as far less obvious than previously
thought.

At the end of the trip, the world re-solidified, and I/my/me popped
back up from somewhere or other. Those few hours in the perfect dream-
world were intriguing; maybe LSD could serve as crowbar in my mental
deconstruction project. I think I tripped about every other weekend
for the first few months, then continued irregularly, several times
each year during 1985-87.

Near the end of this period, I took a serious dose, and a couple of
hours later found myself seeing the universe and my place in it from a
strikingly wide and clear perspective. I saw all those efforts I'd
made for years to detach from my wants and opinions, and how that had
removed some suffering. Then I saw that it was the nature of the
universe that desires arise endlessly. The best I could ever hope for
was a temporary break in the suffering, till new desires and delusions
appeared and continued the cycle. It was like mowing a lawn in which
the grass never stopped growing. Like painting the Golden Gate Bridge,
and finding that as soon as you finish one end, the other end needs
painting again.

I was never going to escape suffering. My whole life direction was
like running on a treadmill. I was like a hamster on one of those
hamster-wheel thingies. It wasn't just tragic, it was meta-tragic. I
mean, Hamlet is a tragedy, but it's OK, because at least people can
watch the play and get touched by existential insight. In my tragedy,
the tragedy of all beings, the tragedy of struggling to find a lasting
refuge from suffering and never ever reaching it, there wasn't even
any audience to appreciate the epic story. OK, maybe the occasional
acid-head could watch it for a few minutes, but that didn't count for
much.

As I languished in this hell, trapped in this box of hopeless
existence, I heard a voice whispering. I'd rarely gotten auditory
hallucinations, and I'd never put much stock in disembodied voices.
But this was a desperate time, and I was ready to listen to anything.
I concentrated on the voice, which was repeating the same phrase over
and over, gradually getting louder. I recognized it as ZMSS's voice,
saying with a light and amused attitude, "Don't make anything."

Suddenly it was clear: the horrific universe I was perceiving, the
"me" trapped in it, all of it, was made by thinking. Just one moment
of not thinking, and that whole world of infinite suffering never
existed. Dang, that was something. That simple little teaching phrase
had saved me from a hell that had no possible escape.

Every year, right after New Years, ZMSS would come to that Zen Center
near me and lead a week-long retreat. I had good reasons to avoid it.
The intensity of Zen practice, the sheer number of hours of sitting
meditation, was greater than anything I'd contemplated previously. All
my years in ashrams, meditating at most a few hours in a day, couldn't
prepare me for it.

The Zen forms (sitting posture, chanting style, rules, etc) would be
new and different. I'd gotten comfortable with the Yoga style, but
this new style would be difficult, even physically painful. At Yoga, I
had some expertise, I'd been an old-timer at the ashram. At a Zen
retreat, I'd be starting over as a rank beginner. I could recite
philosophies from Yoga scriptures decently well, but if I went to the
Zen Master again, there'd be those horribly uncomfortable questions,
and I had absolutely no bloody clue how to respond or what it was all
about.

But there was a major curiosity factor. And I couldn't deny that the
teaching had proven its usefulness. Lots of teachings will work in
most ordinary situations, but "don't make anything" had helped me even
in the midst of the weirdest and worst of extreme bad trips. Crap. As
with the light socket, I'd have to go to that retreat. It was January
1988.

Next time, I'll blog about this first retreat, which included
difficult and amazing experiences during sitting practice, and formal
teaching interviews with ZMSS that hit my mind strongly.

Stuart
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/socalled.htm

This is the 5th chapter of the story of my life and meditation
practices, which I've been writing in installments on my blog at
http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/

In the last episode, I was beginning my first Zen retreat, a week-long
sitting in the Korean tradition. It was led by Zen Master Seung Sahn
(I'll abbreviate as ZMSS), commonly addressed as Dae Soen Sa Nim.

There were a few dozen of us in a single-family residence, with a
connected living room/study area serving as the Dharma room (that's
where the formal group practice takes place; "Dharma" means "truth").
The crowded conditions made for a complete lack of privacy, confusion
in storing and dealing with my personal stuff, lines to the bathroom,
etc. The long hours of a new sitting style, plus the new practice of
108 bows every morning, made my body ache. It was cold, keeping me
awake much of the nights I spent in my sleeping bag on the Dharma room
floor.

I mention all this because it may be a non-trivial part of the
equation: that the first few days had this foundation of physical
discomfort, exhaustion, and frustration. But mostly I'm interested in
trying to articulate the mental experience.

In my earlier years of meditation, I'd spent plenty time obsessing
about proper technique. Should I use a mantra? Which one? Should I
control my breath in a particular way? Should I cultivate a feeling or
hold some belief? Didn't I have to do these things just right in order
to get the enlightenment prize? Different teachers I'd known had
touted particular techniques as the surest, best path to the
absolute... but they were all different.

ZMSS would talk about techniques -- mantra, breath, etc -- but without
the sense that one was better than the other. He did stress, though,
that if you considered the question "What am I?", you'd find yourself
stuck, with nothing in the mind, just "Don't Know." Whatever technique
you like, just do it, but do it with this "Don't-Know Mind."

Keeping a big question appealed to me, because it built on my earlier
practice style, not negating it. Famous Indian teachers, such as
Ramana Maharishi and Nisargadatta Maharaj, had spoken on self-inquiry,
looking into the nature of this "I." There's a story in the Zen
tradition that particularly struck me as in harmony with this
practice:

Huai-jang lived in China centuries ago, on a mountain called Sung
Shan. He somehow heard about a Buddhist temple where Hui-neng had a
strange new teaching. This was in the early generations of the
development of Zen in China; Hui-neng is now known as the sixth
patriarch of Zen. Huai-jang was curious enough to make the long trek
to the temple.

Upon encountering Hui-neng, Huai-jang announced his intention, "I've
traveled here from Sung Shan to receive your teaching." The funny
thing about Hui-neng's response is that he didn't actually give a word
of teaching, not in the sense that Huai-jang was expecting or looking
for. Instead he asked, "What is this thing that has traveled from Sung
Shan?"

Huai-jang had no idea what to say. He turned around, went back home,
and continued his simple life on the mountain. Whatever he did now,
every day, he had that question in his mind, "What is this?" After 8
years, one day, boom, it became clear. He went back to the temple to
see Hui-neng again. This time, when the patriarch asked him the same
question, Huai-jang replied, "To say even one word is to miss the
point entirely." Hui-neng accepted his answer, acknowledging his
enlightenment, and Huai-jang became the seventh patriarch of Zen.

I took up this story as my guide, intending to compress Huai-jang's 8
years into my week-long retreat. It was just like the self-inquiry
that I'd read about and tried in India. Except that the Indian
teachers and scriptures tended to speak of this self in such
beautiful, poetic terms. Stuff like: "Prajnanam Brahma: Consciousness
is infinite, the absolute, the highest Truth." On web sites dedicated
to Ramana's teachings, the self we're inquiring into is described with
phrases like "ultimate truth" and "complete immersion in God."

Zen style would have none of that. It was always sparse: What am I?
Don't know. What will all this effort get me? Don't know. So what
should I do next? Just try, try, try.

Everything about it was simple and direct. The chanting had its
appeal, but nothing like the lush melodic beauty of Indian chants. The
Yoga sitting style had been more relaxed, with eyes closed, allowing a
pleasant, dreamy mind-state. Zen posture was tighter, eyes open, just
facing what is.

I sat there, keeping "What am I?", and it was interesting for a short
time. Then it became more and more obvious that any answer I thought
of, no matter how insightful or clever, was by definition thinking. So
then what am I before thinking? ZMSS used to say, "Descarte said, 'I
think, therefore I am.' But if I'm not thinking ... what?"

On top of all the physical discomfort, I now had the profound
frustration of this self-inquiry process. How could I make the
slightest head-way, when whatever idea I came up with was immediately
useless? But I'd made the decision to stay the week, and wanted above
all to not end up with regrets, with "What if I'd just tried a little
harder?"

I'd remember repeatedly the advice I'd read in some classic Zen book.
It said with this type of practice, you'd sometimes feel like a
mosquito trying to bite through a thick steel door. When that happens,
just continue the questioning with still greater effort.

Even if you're trying to empty the ocean with a spoon, at least you've
got a tool that's of some value. But in this task of inquiring into my
true self, it was becoming horribly apparent that the tool I'd always
used before -- thinking, understanding -- wasn't just inadequate, it
was useless. I looked to my will, the center of my being, all around,
trying to find anything at all that I could throw at the question.

Thus passed the first few days of retreat. In the next blog entry,
I'll talk about the other aspect of the retreat, the private
interviews with ZMSS, in which he introduced me to the formal teaching
style of this tradition. Through a combination of that teaching, my
exhaustive efforts, and hell, I dunno, something different appeared.

Stuart
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/socalled.htm

This is the 6th chapter of the story of my life and meditation
practices, which I've been writing in installments on my blog at
http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/

I've been describing my first Zen retreat. The previous blog post was
about the the initial efforts of formal sitting and keeping the great
question "What is this?" or "What am I?" This post will be about the
daily private interviews with Zen Master Seung Sahn (ZMSS, aka Dae
Soen Sa Nim). In the better-known Japanese-style Zen, these sessions
are called koan practice. In Korean, the word is kong-an.

I'd read a lot about kong-ans, and had squeezed some info from the
more senior students I'd talked to, so I had some idea of what I was
supposed to say and do. ZMSS would ask these strange, pointed
questions, and it was my challenge to respond from the direct, before-
thinking experience of that moment. It was like pushing the Clear
button of your mental calculator (ZMSS would say). First you return to
zero. Then from there, respond to the just-now situation: 1+1=2.

I had a few things going for me. First, I was outrageously intimidated
by ZMSS. The fear and adrenaline made it kind of hard to think anyway,
allowing me to automatically answer with whatever popped up. Also,
ZMSS' Korean accent and broken grammar forced me to use most of my
mental energy to just understand what he said. That helped keep the
conversation simple.

Following are some memories that have stuck with me from those early
interviews.

After some preliminary explanation, ZMSS went right to the big guns.
"What is God?" he asked. I knew that in Zen, this question was the
same as asking about Truth, Buddha, Mind, Consciousness, etc. Those
are all different words that point to the substance of everything.

I knew I shouldn't wax philosophical about how each and every thing is
God. That may be a good idea, but it's just an idea, just thinking.
(An ancient Zen master had famously said, "Even a good thing isn't as
good as nothing.") I'd been told to respond to kong-ans not with
explanations, but out of the truth of that moment. What did I perceive
just now? "Your robe is grey," I answered. "Correct," said ZMSS. It
was nice to get that little matter, God and Truth and all that, out of
the way.

ZMSS put a mug of water between us. "What is this?" he asked. I
replied that it was water. "That's just name," ZMSS said. "You're
attached to name. What is it?" I had nothing, so ZMSS told me to ask
the question back at him. When I did so, he immediately took a drink.
I see. To be intimate with all things, just do it, moment to moment.

"What is your name?" ZMSS asked. "Stuart," I replied. "No, no, no," he
scoffed. "That's just body's name." It was confusing. I'd given a
clear, simple answer. His words, though, were a philosophical idea,
the type of unnecessary thinking I'd been told to throw away. But what
could I say? How could I question his teaching, when he was the Big
Zen Master, and I was the new kid?

After some awkward silence, ZMSS explained, "Now you must say, 'You
are incorrect, Zen Master.' When I make mistake, you must correct it."
Wow. After all the years I'd spent meeting gurus who claimed
perfection, here was ZMSS, right from the get-go, saying that I had to
watch for his mistakes.

[As a courtesy to any readers who may someday want to try this
practice themselves, I'll relate the rest of these memories without
giving any more actual kong-an answers. The answers aren't the
important thing anyway; it's all about questioning, about finding and
using Don't Know Mind.]

ZMSS handed me a book and pointed to a paragraph for me to read aloud.
It was about Buddha's Flower Sermon. All Zennies know this story.
Buddha was set to give a discourse, and many hundreds had gathered to
hear the Renowned Holy Teacher explain enlightenment 'n' stuff. But
when he faced the assembly, Buddha said nothing. He just stood there a
few minutes, and then held up a flower.

No one in the vast audience understood. Then a monk named Mahakashyapa
looked at that flower and smiled. Buddha saw him smile and said, "I
have got the Wondrous Dharma Seal of the Supremely Enlightened Mind,
the Gateless Gate to Formless Nirvana. I now transmit it to
Mahakashyapa."

All Zen schools and Masters trace their lineage back to that
transmission incident. What was it about? What was transmitted? Damned
if I knew. It was a puzzle, and I like puzzles. Maybe with intense
contemplation and special experiences or something, I'd figure it out
some day.

I finished the reading and waited for my question. "Buddha held up
flower," said ZMSS. "Mahakashyapa smiled. Why did Mahakashyapa smile?"

Was he kidding? I'd been doing Zen for about 3 days, and he was asking
me about the great fundamental secret? I wanted to understand... but
my mind went blank. How the hell was I supposed to know?

I tried the technique I use in poker games, staring ZMSS right in the
eyes, looking for a tell. My read on his expression was that he'd give
up absolutely nothing. But he seemed supremely patient, ready to wait
forever till I got it myself. And most bizarrely, he looked like he
had every expectation that I could answer!

Uncomfortable seconds passed. Then out of nowhere, a response
appeared, as if on its own. It wasn't like I knew the right answer. It
was like the answer had come from a place before thinking, where
there's no right and no wrong. It was only a moment later that I
realized that I'd given an answer, and checked ZMSS for his response.
"Ah," he said, "now you understand smile."

After days of sitting, I was super-sensitized to what was going on in
my mind. It was amazing how the answer had appeared right out of the
Don't Know. Maybe this'd inspire me to keep plugging away at "What am
I?"

Kong-an answers -- good answer, bad answer, no answer -- don't matter.
Even if you answer one, the teacher just throws a new one at you,
bringing back Don't Know.

"Somebody comes to Zen Center," said ZMSS, "smoking a cigarette. He
walks to Buddha-statue, blows smoke in Buddha's face, drops ashes on
Buddha's head. You're there. What can you do?"

I tried to stay in the moment. "There's no cigarette-man here," I
said. ZMSS immediately mimed a cigarette in his hand and pretended to
smoke. "I am cigarette-man!" he declared. "What can you do?"

I was befuddled again. "But... you're not smoking..." I offered with
hesitation. "Don't check!" ZMSS shouted back.

This time, no answer appeared. Seeing that I was hopelessly stuck,
ZMSS changed his tone. "You must attain True Self," he told me. "What
is True Self?" he asked, then he paused.

The pause seemed very long, because something big was going on in my
mind. What is True Self? I'd been asking that question constantly for
days. In a sense, I'd been asking it my whole life. I could tell that
ZMSS had brought up the question rhetorically, that in a few seconds,
he'd give me his own answer.

Of course, everything in this tradition had been teaching me that any
answer was just an idea, just thinking. Zen-style didn't depend on a
secret, special answer from a teacher. Zen meant not depending on
anything. But my habit, my reflex of wanting to get something from an
authority, was still there.

I saw a big "I want" in my mind, a desire for this Famous Zen Master
to just give me the answer, so I could stick it in my pocket and hold
onto it forever. This "I want" was like a fish, ready to swallow
whatever juicy worm ZMSS was about to give me. A fish too hungry to
notice what hook might be hidden in the worm.

"What is True Self?" ZMSS repeated. Then, slowly and deliberately, he
answered, "I... DON'T... KNOW!"

Oh yeah, that. I returned to my cushion in the meditation room, ready
to continue sitting with the great question and the big Don't Know.
About an hour later, a very interesting thing happened, which I'll
blog about next time.

Stuart
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/socalled.htm

On my blog -- http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/ -- I've been
writing in installments the story of my life and meditation practices.
This is Chapter 7: "Like Space":

(Somebody asked about how and why I've come to my current Zen-style
meditation practice, particularly in light of my earlier experiences
of other methods. So I'm doing this series of blogs that explain the
path that brought me to this particular practice and life-direction.
The story is mostly about getting into the Zen tradition, with some
context to show how it fits in with my life history. I'm calling this
series "Autobiography of a Boo Boo," in homage to the Hanna Barbera
cartoons of my youth, and in recognition that I've never been good
enough to be called a Yogi.)

In this post, I'm a bit past the half-way point of my first Zen
retreat, a week-long sit in 1988. Earlier posts have detailed my
initial struggles with formal sitting and self-inquiry, as well as the
daily interviews (koan or kong-an practice) with Zen Master Seung Sahn
(ZMSS), aka Dae Soen Sa Nim.

Four or five days had gone by, filled with endless hours on the
cushion, bringing up the great question, looking for the true nature
of my self and this moment. Over and over, answers would appear in my
mind. Then another thought would appear, recognizing my answer as an
idea, as just thinking. The cycle had repeated itself -- I can only
estimate -- approximately a billion times. Still at square one. I
hadn't advanced a millimeter, hadn't made a dent in "What am I?"

I'd gotten nothing but exhausted on every level. Even the thoughts
themselves seemed tired, not passing in a blur, but kind of limping by
on crutches. At least that made it easier to see each thought for what
it was. Like watching a magic trick in slow motion: after a while,
it's no longer amazing, it's just some guy pulling a Nerf ball from
his sleeve.

I'd been tangled up in my efforts to crack the great mystery of
existence. At this particular point, I started to get a little
perspective. I felt like I was watching these physical and mental
struggles... as if I were in a movie theater, and thoughts (feelings,
perceptions, sensations, everything) were flickering lights on the
screen.

This witnessing perspective wasn't so new or unusual. It was just that
the first part of the retreat had been so challenging that I'd been
enmeshed in my efforts for days, unable to simply observe till now. It
was a bit of a relief.

Then, I dunno, something shifted. Hey, it wasn't that I was watching
flickering lights on a movie screen. Holy Shit! EVERYTHING was like
flickering lights, INCLUDING that thing called "I"! Jesus Tap-Dancing
Christ! For so so long, that "I" had seemed so so solid. But it was a
thought, appearing and disappearing, just like the rest of them.

Suddenly, all pain and fatigue disappeared. There was no problem;
there wasn't even the possibility of problems. There wasn't anything
solid to which a problem could adhere. This wasn't fuzzy like drug-
induced euphoria. What did ZMSS always say? Don't Know is "clear like
space." Of course! What's space like? It's empty; it's like... nothing
at all.

The rest of the sitting session passed by seamlessly, with all
thoughts, all things, just appearing and disappearing. Except that now
and then, a thought would appear that was a bit stickier than the
rest, a thought that started to gain weight, and threaten to become
substantial. Thoughts like, "Will this last forever? Is this that
Spiritual Enlightenment I've heard about?" But each time, within a
second or two, it became clear that this too was just insubstantial
thinking. Self, no-self, enlightenment, no-enlightenment, temporary,
permanent... all just thoughts, coming and going, by natural process.

The sitting session ended, time for an hour-long break before dinner.
What to do? I left the house, and walked towards the U.C. Berkeley
campus a block away, curious about what the world would be like. It
felt as if for my whole life, I'd been walking into a stiff wind,
fighting resistance with each step. The wind had been so constant that
I didn't even notice it. And now, my body had somehow become porous,
transparent, empty or something, so the wind could pass right through
it. There was no more resistance, everything was effortless.

The northern border of campus was a busy street without a traffic
light. I'd crossed it here hundreds of times. Often it wasn't
reasonable to wait till there was no traffic, so I'd make an automatic
calculation of how far away the cars were and how fast they were
going, and attempt to walk across safely.

Walking across the street was the same this time... except wait, there
was something missing. Typically, as I crossed, there'd be a little
voice in my head, saying something like, "What if I misjudged? Maybe
I'm wrong; maybe I'll get run over. Damn, that'd make me feel stupid!"
Maybe that voice was what ZMSS had called "checking."

I hadn't noticed my checking so much all those other times. Now,
though, its absence was evident. Of course I was trying to avoid
getting killed, but there was a limit to what I could know for sure.
My job was to do my best to cross correctly, step by step. Beyond
that... hell, that was all! I had to laugh.

I hadn't walked 50 feet into the campus when I saw a young woman
approaching me. There was something about her body language, or maybe
it was the stack of pamphlets she was carrying, that made me suspect
she was a Jesus Person. Y'know, one of those folks who stop you on the
street and try to get you to accept Christ and save your soul. I'd
always been a magnet for them. This should be interesting.

In upcoming entries, I'll tell an amusing story about getting
proselytized, and then describe how I finished the final days of
retreat, got some key direction from ZMSS, and tried to digest it all.
Kindly bear with me; just a couple few more of these blogs and I think
I can bring this long and tiresome story to a close.

Stuart

http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/socalled.htm

On my blog -- http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/ -- I've been
writing in installments the story of my life and meditation practices.
This is Chapter 8: "Buddhism":

(Somebody asked about how and why I've come to my current Zen-style
meditation practice, particularly in light of my earlier experiences
of other methods. So I'm doing this series of blogs that explain the
path that brought me to this particular and life-direction. The story
is mostly about getting into the Zen tradition, with some context to
show how it fits in with my life history. I'm calling this series
"Autobiography of a Boo Boo," in homage to the Hanna Barbera cartoons
of my youth, and in recognition that I've never been good enough to be
called a "Yogi.")

In the last entry, it was the 4th or 5th day of intense sitting, my
first Zen retreat back in 1988, and I'd had a big breakthrough in
meditation. Just afterwards, during the pre-dinner break, I'd gone on
a walk through the U.C. Berkeley campus, still enraptured with this
perception of all things appearing and disappearing without hindrance.
A young woman approached me, and I had a strong suspicion that she was
a Jesus Person. That is, she had in her eyes the look of a True
Believer, someone who'd stop strangers on the street to preach the
Gospel and save souls.

I had a history of frequently being accosted by Jesus People. Maybe I
had the aura of a seeker, or a lost soul. Maybe it was my Semitic
appearance. Do Jesus People get extra points for converting a Jew?

Allow me a short tangent here to tell the story of my favorite
encounter of this sort. At another time, there'd been this Jesus
Person who was trying to get me to attend a weekly religious worship
that his group held. The conversation went like this:

**********

Jesus Person (JP): C'mon, this is very important, you really need to
come to our service.

Me: I'm not sure... Tell me, what do you do?

JP: I told you, it's a service.

Me: Yeah, you said that. But I'm asking: what do you do?

JP: We pray. We sing hymns. And we read from the Bible.

Me: Listen, it's nice of you to invite me. Maybe some day I'll stop
by; I really do like to try new and different things. But I'll be
completely honest with you, right up front. I don't like the Bible.

JP: Would you like a Miller Lite?

**********

(My mind reeled. I'd misjudged this guy totally! My head was filled
with images of a church service with an open bar. Of a Bible
discussion group that degenerates into drunken partying. Could this be
real?)

**********

Me: What?!?

JP: I said, "Would you like Eternal Life?"

**********

(I didn't want to be a jerk, but I just couldn't stop laughing.
Eventually I was able to blurt out, "No, no, no, I'm not interested in
that," and JP left me alone.)

OK, back to our story. The young woman on campus, the one I was sure
was a Jesus Person, did walk right up to me. "Hi," she said, "I'm a
Buddhist!"

The universe has such a great sense of humor. I just love its ironic
timing. For the first and only time in my life, I was about to get
proselytized by a Buddha Person! What are the odds?

"Me too!" I gushed. "I'm a Buddhist too!" Maybe all those hours I'd
just spent with my ass on the cushion had qualified me for membership
in the club. Or maybe my mind at that moment was sufficiently mirror-
like that I'd have responded the same way, regardless of what she'd
claimed to be. If she'd said she was a Methodist, I'd probably have
said, "I'm a Methodist too!" Likewise if she were a communist. Or
Satanist. Or philatelist.

It turns out that there's a huge variation among people who call
themselves "Buddhist." This Buddha Person (BP) explained that
"Buddhism" to her meant congregational chanting of a mantra (something
like "Namyo Ho Rengye Kyo") in order to get whatever you want in life.

I think that chanting mantras is great... but how long can you do it?
An hour a day? I prefer repeating mantras silently, since I can do
that while commuting on the train, or other times when my mind isn't
otherwise engaged. But even then, it's hardly a 24/7 practice. For
much of my day, I'm at work, where I need to focus on computer code,
not mantras.

I didn't like BP's definition of Buddhism. Why not practice something
that's available everywhere, all the time? I tried to explain:

**********

Me: What do you do for a living? You probably can't be chanting
mantras while you're working, right?

BP: Right. I teach high school math during the day. I do my chanting
after work.

Me: But even while you're working, you can still practice Buddhism...

BP: Oh no. It's a public school.

Me: That's not what I mean. If it's your job to teach math, and you're
doing your best to help your students learn... that's Buddhism!

**********

At the time, the words were just coming out of my mouth automatically.
In retrospect, I realize that I'd gotten this kind of speech from the
teacher at the retreat, Zen Master Seung Sahn (ZMSS), aka Dae Soen Sa
Nim. Days earlier, he'd given a talk and Q&A, and it had included one
of my favorite interchanges from him ever.

One of the questions had been from a Zen student who was a father. He
explained to ZMSS that he'd been trying unsuccessfully to get his
daughter to come to the Zen Center. His daughter had a friend who'd
taken her to church, so now, the daughter preferred Christianity over
Zen. "So my question is this," he concluded. "How can I get my
daughter to understand Buddhism?"

In a flash, ZMSS replied, "Your daughter understands Buddhism better
than you do!"

"I don't understand," said the father.

"True Buddhism," ZMSS explained, "means moment-to-moment, when you're
doing something, just do it. If you go to a church... and when it's
time to stand up and sing, you stand up and sing... and when it's time
to kneel down and pray, you kneel down and pray... that's Buddhism!"

Anyway: it was time to say good-bye to the BP and make my way back to
the Zen Center for dinner, followed by evening chanting and sitting.
There were two days left in the retreat. In the next blog, I'll
receive some more great pointers from ZMSS. And then there'll be an
epilogue to try to bring this story full circle.

Stuart
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/socalled.htm

On my blog -- http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/ -- I've been
writing in installments the story of my life and meditation practices.
This is Chapter 9: "Why?":

(Somebody asked about how and why I've come to my current Zen-style
meditation practice, particularly in light of my earlier experiences
of other methods. So I'm doing this series of blogs that explain the
path that brought me to this particular and life-direction. The story
is mostly about getting into the Zen tradition, with some context to
show how it fits in with my life history. I'm calling this series
"Autobiography of a Boo Boo," in homage to the Hanna Barbera cartoons
of my youth, and in recognition that I've never been good enough to be
called a "Yogi.")

I've been writing about the 7-day retreat in 1988 that inspired my
decision to practice Zen. For the first part of the week, I'd
painfully struggled with the big question, "What am I?" Then during
one sitting session, it had all dissolved into emptiness, punctuated
by insubstantial thinking that came and went without hindrance. It
felt amazing, as I described in the previous two entries.

Now it was the next day, and time again for my formal interview with
Zen Master Seung Sahn (ZMSS, aka Dae Soen Sa Nim). I had no plan to
discuss my meditation experience with him. It's not like I understood
what had happened anyway. It's not like I had anything coherent to say
about it. Even without words, though, maybe ZMSS' lifetime of intense
practices would give him some special insight, allowing him to see
that my mind was different. Or maybe my shit-eating grin at that point
was so obvious that any idiot would notice.

ZMSS' manner was more stern and intense than in the previous days. For
his first question, he demanded, "Why do you eat every day?" I mimed
putting food into my mouth, like a hungry person. That said it all,
didn't it? Each moment comes and goes naturally. When it's meal time,
you eat. What more could there possibly be to life?

"No good!" shouted ZMSS. "That's like a dog. A dog just eats when he's
hungry. A human being's job is different from a dog's job. Why do you
eat every day? Why do you live in this world?"

I don't remember exactly how ZMSS explained it at that time, but
here's the gist as I understood it. Our thinking is like scribbles on
a blackboard. Sometimes, maybe with lots of effort, we erase all the
scribbles and have a completely clean blackboard. That may bring a
wonderful feeling of freedom.

But you don't leave a blackboard empty. What are you going to write on
it? It's like a calculator after you hit the clear button and return
to zero. One more step is necessary for the blackboard or calculator
to function correctly. In ZMSS' teaching, it's loud and clear what he
tells us to write on that blackboard: Help all beings.

The Buddhist direction of "Save all beings from suffering" has at
least one great virtue. If you accept that as your goal, you don't
have to worry about ever reaching it and having to find a new one.
Beyond that, this teaching turned around my view of what practice was
about. I'd always looked at meditation and such as a means to getting
some special experience, or insight, something like that. ZMSS seemed
more concerned about intention. Why practice, why eat, why live? For
what? For who? Whatever you got, good or bad, if it was for me, it'd
bring suffering. If it was for all beings, then no problem.

The final day of the retreat arrived, and I returned to ZMSS's room
for the last private interview. His first question to me: "Today is
the last day of retreat. What have you attained?"

That week had been far and away the most astounding experience of my
life. But I was clueless as to anything I could say about it. Keeping
silent wouldn't do either. If you ask a rock a question, it can be
silent, but a human being ought to have something more than that.

Maybe I should show the mirror-like clarity of my mind by reflecting
that moment? "The wall is white," I said. ZMSS shook his head,
rejecting the answer.

Uhhh... maybe he was looking for that compassion thing he'd talked
about? "How can I help you?" I offered. ZMSS swept that answer aside
also. Jeez, not even that?

Typically, Zen teachers won't give away answers, waiting instead for
the student to find it himself. But ZMSS came to Berkeley only once a
year, and maybe he thought I needed to understand something before
that. After I repeatedly failed to give a satisfactory answer, he
eventually relented: "Now you ask me."

"OK," I said. "Today is the last day of retreat. Zen Master, what have
YOU attained?"

He gave me a one-sentence answer that made my jaw drop with its
elegance. A response that met the question, and did so without even a
speck of I or no-I, attainment or no-attainment. A response that
clearly demonstrated not making anything.

The retreat ended, and I returned to ordinary, everyday life. I'll
write one final blog in this series, an epilogue to talk about how
that's been going.

Stuart
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/socalled.htm

On my blog -- http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/ -- I've been
writing in installments the story of my life and meditation practices.
This is Chapter 10: "Epilogue (Up to Your Ass in Analogies)":

(This series of blogs explains how I've come to my current Zen-style
meditation practice. I'm calling the series "Autobiography of a Boo
Boo," in homage to the Hanna Barbera cartoons of my youth, and in
recognition that I've never been good enough to be called a Yogi.)

At the end of my first retreat, Zen Master Seung Sahn (ZMSS, aka Dae
Soen Sa Nim) gave a talk. He said that we refer to the intensity of a
retreat as "hard practice," but more accurately it's "hot practice."
The mind is sometimes like ice. It's not flexible; you can't wash your
hands in ice. We do "hot practice" to melt the mind, so it becomes
like water, freely taking the shape of any situation whatsoever. The
final words of his talk were, "Don't make anything; just do it!"

Water flows anywhere; it doesn't attach to any thing or any idea.
That's what it felt like after the retreat, not clinging to anything.
But... maybe I could make one tiny exception. The sense of clarity that
arose so strongly during the final retreat days... couldn't I cling to
that? The wonderful feeling of freedom, the beautiful understanding
that everything is insubstantial... if I held onto just that much, and
made it into something special... that wouldn't be cheating too much,
would it?

I heard an analogy about "spiritual addiction" (from "non-dual"
teacher Ayashanti). Imagine that for your whole life, you've thought
you were very poor. One day, someone tells you, "You've got diamonds
in your shoes." You don't believe him, because you know you're poor.

Eventually you get desperate enough. You've exhausted all other hope,
so what the hell, you take off your shoes and check inside. Holy shit!
There really are diamonds in your shoes! That moment when you discover
that you're not impoverished (and really never were) is extraordinary.
"Spiritual addiction" is clinging to the feelings you get from the
discovery. The value of diamonds isn't in those feelings. It's in
spending the diamonds, using them in a way that helps all beings.

Here's a cruder analogy. Growing up, I chewed Bazooka bubble gum.
Inside each 1-cent pack, there'd be a little comic. In one of them,
Bazooka Joe sees his friend hitting himself over the head with a
hammer. When Joe asks why, the friend explains, "Because it feels so
good when I stop!"

My peak experience in the Zen retreat was something like that. For
most of my life, I'd been holding these delusions about my "self" as a
substantial thing. When that delusion disappeared in meditation, it
was wonderful. The magnitude of that wonderfulness was equal to the
magnitude of the delusion. If I wanted to hold or repeat that
wonderful experience, what was I going to do? Build a new, even bigger
delusion, so I could feel so good when it disappeared?

ZMSS had called the retreat "dry-cleaning your mind with don't-know
soap." Indeed, it felt like I'd taken a mental shower that left
everything pristine. But no matter how thoroughly you take a shower,
you can't do it once and be finished. Every day you get dirty, so you
make a habit of regularly cleaning the dirt away.

In addition to practice in day-to-day life, I do a day or two of
sitting retreat, every month or so since that first one. These are
retreats headed by different teachers in ZMSS' school. During the
first year, I was still processing the special experience of my first
retreat, and discussed it with these teachers.

When I told Zen Master Su Bong about it, he asked, "Do you want to get
that experience again?" I said, "Yeah." And he said, "Then you can't
have it."

Zen Master Soeng Hyang's advice was even simpler. The words may seem
harsh in black-and-white, but they were delivered very gently. Here's
what she told me: "Just forget about it."

ZMSS talked about the need to "digest" understanding. I pondered that
word for years. If you've got an apple in your hand, it's obviously
separate from your body. After you eat it, for a while it's still
there in your stomach. When it's digested, though, the apple becomes
one with your body, and otherwise it no longer exists.

Was I holding the experience and understanding from the retreat, as if
it were a thing that I'd gotten? Over the years, maybe I've digested
it, but who knows. How can you tell if something's completely
digested? You'd have to examine what you excrete, and who wants to do
that?

Damn, this analogy has turned way too disgusting. Forget I said
anything.

THE END

Stuart
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/socalled.htm