Peanut Butter and Jelly

Tuesday (I've been sick since then so I'm not entirely responsible for what I say or do) I was cornered by someone who found out that I practiced Zen. They saw me and started peppering me with the standard questions. "What is enlightenment (and can I get it by Thursday or Friday)? How do you meditate? Do you think the Buddha was a real person?" After about three minutes of this, I said "Peanut butter and jelly!" He stopped talking and just looked at me, as though I'm crazy.

In that momentary silence I told him, "If you're really interested in Zen, the real questions is why meditate, why is in what we call Zazen (sitting in unification). The answer is to harmonize the Mind, since our mind does not naturally do so." In this I was reflecting back on a teisho my Genjo Marinello called Positive Samadhi.

I continued on, "You see, a dog goes woof-woof. It never thinks about going woof-woof, it is just naturally harmonized with the barking. My teacher says water and pail, bird and sky naturally harmonize. I say peanut butter and jelly naturally go together. But it is a human being that can have such a difficulty acting in love and compassion consistently. Our mind and ego get in the way and don't seem to naturally harmonize with things. But this is not so for dogs, birds, water and pail, peanut butter and jelly. And so we sit in meditation, the great connector and tool we use to harmonize with. But connect and harmonize to what? Some people call it God, I call it Mu, some call it This life, and other people call it the Dharma. That's all."

As I was walking away, he said, "wanna get a cup of coffee, they harmonize don't they?" I said, "yes they do, but right now I'm hungry for peanut butter and jelly."

Namaste'

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO