A Difficult Moment

We had something of a scare last night. My oldest daughter fell and dislocated her leg badly. Her knee was 45 degrees reversed, she was in terrible pain and there was nothing that anyone could do. The paramedics where called and did an excellent job taking care of her. Eventually they got her to the hospital.

When I got to the hospital to meet the ambulance and my wife, it was a tough moment. You want to be able to reach in and protect your child or removing the suffering, but this is not always possible. What then?

As she laid on the hospital bed, in great pain, hooked up to many different machines and she's begging for the pain to be taken away - it's a moment that goes right though you and every thing becomes clear. There is nothing inside of that moment. It's total focus. The only other thing that Alex wanted was her parents and friend Kristi. We held her hand, let her know how much we love her and supported her in what ever way that we could.

Eventually the doctor was able to get her knee back into place. They then got her leg immobilized and she felt a lot better. Today we have to take her to see an orthopedic doctor to continue to work on her.

It's in those moments that as a parent that panic does not work. With Deb and I there was a kind of steady determination that took over. We could only offer encouragement, let her know that we where there and talk with her.

One other interesting thing that appeared was when Kristi encouraged Alex to breath from her hara and center her breath. This actually helped her. It was evident when her blood pressure went from 163/84 to 140/80. Zen (unification) was working. What could be more right than that?

When that happened I recalled, "It helps you cross the river when the bridge is down. It guide you home on the moonless night." That so-called "It," is what Eido Roshi calls Mu. The inexpressible will meet you, where-ever we are at and help us whether we know it or not. That is where I put my belief, faith and has been my experience, time after time.

This morning Alex is still in a lot of pain and as I mentioned, we will take her to the doctor and continue to help her, with a steadiness of Mind. There is nothing else to do, but This.

Gassho,

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

What Drives You?

Tony Robbin's did a 20 minutes on TedTalks. The video speaks for itself.



Happiness,

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

Birthday

Today is my oldest daughters 13th birthday. Looking back, it's really hard to imagine our family having ever been without her. It just seems right that she is here. I have a deep appreciation for that. It was life giving birth to life. That is truly a miracle. If we fail to see the miracle of birth, we have missed something very big and should go back and look again, to notice and capture a glimpse of Its vastness.

Each of us has a mother and father that enabled us to be here in this moment and take the very breath that we are taking now. Given this miracle and opportunity, it seems that we can and should seize this moment to evince and share what is within us. This life, your life, my life is very special.

I think of Milarepa's words when he said, "I want to live and die without regret." The only way that I could regret this life is by not being that which I really want to be. If we want to be a good father, mother or friend, then we should do that. If we feel the urge or pull to show kindness or compassion, we should let that flow.

I am grateful everyday for the birth of my daughter. Though I have had opportunities to give things to her, she too has given a lot to our family. Her sense of being, intelligence and humor is no different than yours or mine and serves to expand and deepen what is here and what we may experience. Simply appreciating this, brings a certain warmth and happiness that is there for each of us. This is the thing that matters most.

Namaste',

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

As is the Heart, so is the Life

"As The Heart, So is the Life. That which is within is ceaselessly becoming the without. Nothing remains unrevealed. That which is hidden is but for a time; it ripens and comes forth at last. Seed, tree, blossom, and fruit are the fourfold order of the universe. From the state of a man's heart proceed the conditions of his life. His thoughts blossom into deeds; and his deeds bear the fruitage of character and destiny.

Life is ever unfolding from within, and revealing itself to the light, and thoughts engendered in the heart at last reveal themselves in words, actions, and things accomplished.

As the fountain from the hidden spring, so flows forth a man's life from the secret recesses of his heart. All that he is and does is generated there. All that he will be and do will take its rise there.

Sorrow and happiness, suffering and enjoyment, fear and hope, hatred and love, ignorance and enlightenment, are nowhere but in the heart. They are solely mental conditions."

James Allen
Excerpt | Out From The Heart

That Got My Attention

Sometimes a useful question is ask ourselves "what am I paying attention to?" Mind you, it's not that we may change anything, but we just want to strive to be aware of what has our mind "hooked." As we begin to [clearly] notice what we are paying attention to, then the Buddha's words "what we think about expands," can have added value and meaning. Once we are aware of what we are paying attention to, the next question is, "what is expanding for me, at this very moment?"

We I use this exercise, I instantly give myself choices and options about how I am interacting with myself and my environment. Like I said before, it's not that I may change something in my behavior or attitude, but simply noticing what has the capacity to hold my mind in place. Then at the least you can say, "that got my attention."

Namaste'

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

Facing Up

There are moments and places in time where we have to so-called "Face-up," to situations. We need to see past the bullshit and fix, repair, eliminate, change, work through a situation from that place within ourselves that is very, very, very clear. While I know that taking responsibility is no fun, it does feed the fire of integrity.

I have often said, the best translation I've heard for the word Zen is "Unification." And Zazen is to "Sit in Unification." If I'm not driving to unify myself and my life, then what am I doing? What are you doing? This moment is our time. This moment is our now and there is no sense in putting it off. This life-time is an amazing opportunity, to be authentic, to be real - stepping outside of our dreams and delusions. It's so valuable. I just hope that we do not waste or miss THIS opportunity to use it. Gyo (Practice)!

It's time to "face-up." As Bussui says, "If not in this life time, then when will you?" No other lifetime exists other than now.

Gassho,

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

Bullies

I deal with a couple people almost every day, who are incredibly intense and only seem to see things from their personal perspective. Oddly they can lack a certain ability to simply listen, mostly because they are interested in their own agenda. It's a very difficult situation.

One person in particular just seems to surf waves of anger and hostility as he encounters people. He's impressively abusive and he doesn't even seem to recognize it. He seems always on the attack and at any moment ready to take it to people. It's kind of sad really, because I knew him before he turned into this guy. But then again, maybe he was always like this and just hid it. people can get pretty god at acting.

It's often frustrating to deal with him. When I interact with him, I am often thinking, "how can I harmonize and work effectively, with this person?" Usually it seems to no avail, because he so easily strikes out and attacks people. Sometimes, I think of him more as an emotional or psychological bully. How do you deal with that?

On this, I have no concrete answer (yet). It's a work in progress. But I can tell you what I do thus far. I do a lot of Zazen and do whatever I can to minimize my contact. Personally, I think it's always best to get out of the way of a charging bull. The other thing I tend to do is remind myself it's his baggage and not mine. I don't need to carry or internalize other people's negative luggage. The last thing is minimize my reactions, as much as possible and to be kind as possible (maybe as some point he will be in a space where he can honestly receive it). Though I'm not always successful, it does help a lot.

To become what he and others like him has a high price tag with it and would serve no positive purpose. It's not helpful to feed into the illusion/delusions of others. When I figure this one out, I will defiantly let you know.

May All Beings Be Happy and Free,

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

I Will Be There For You

Last night, I was talking with my sister, spending time on the phone. I've been doing a lot of that with her lately. On Monday, she had surgery preparing the way for her pending start of dialysis. This has been a new issue among other serious medical issues she has been struggling with. It has been an emotional and vexing time. All of my life June has been a rock. Steady, clear, supportive and what I call, "the best version of ourselves." Yet something has begun to slightly modify and here is where things can get a little tough for our family.

In Buddhism, we talk about so-called "sickness, old age and death." When we are young, all that it looks and sound more like a theoretical rather than an actual. Now that we are at a certain point, things seem to have clarified and we have found out what is really important. It's certainly not the triviality of our lives.

During a particular conversation, June said "With all of these hospitalizations and feeling bad all the time, it really makes you think." When she said it, I knew what she meant. What has my life meant? What will happen to me? What have I left behind? It's the doubts.

My response to her is, "I will be here for You. I will remind you about what you've known all of your life." She asked, "what's that?" "That this whole world is shining and beautiful. So if your going to start feeling sorry for yourself, as your little brother I will have to kick your ass into shape and constantly remind you of that." She laughed saying, "That's why I call you about things like this. You have become my rock." That one hit the heart and tears of appreciation fell from both of us. No gaps and no distance.

Namaste',

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

Out of the Net

Lately I've felt like I'm able to hear more deeply. Given this moment, I've been taking advantage of it and going back through Teisho's with Genjo Osho. It's been saind, "the more and more you listen, the more and more you hear."

Sunday, last night and then this morning, I (re)listened to a teisho entitled Golden Carp. At one point Genjo Osho said, "In Rohatsu, we are really in it together. Really in the pressure cooker, and we do bring fatigue and pain, and all of our sorrows to the forefront and cook 'em! We cook 'em right there on the cushion. Melt them down, blend them in, mix them up, drain them out and bake, even though it's in the cold of winter. We bake and bake and bake on the cushion."

Those things that I have brought to my own zafu, that have caused me to feel broken, in authentic, to feel out of sync with myself have been like a fishing net which I have been caught in. And like the Golden Carp in the water, I've struggled, struggled and struggled to exhaustion, at various points in my life. Some have called this point "the dark night of the soul." Those are tough moments that don't seem productive at the time but somehow produce it later.

But the saving grace for me has been a force which has kept me from drowning. Some people are prone to say, "I found this," or "I found that." For me, the truth is that Zen found me and that has kept me from sinking below the surface. Once, when I was living at Dai Bosatsu Zendo, I distinctly recalled Eido Roshi saying "As much as you make think that you choose your life, that is only one half of the equation, because life chooses you as well. That is the other half." Though I don't know why I am telling you this part right now, it seems somehow important to say. It's an element that has helped to get me out of the net I had created for my self.

Genjo Osho goes on to say, "We compress or another way to think about it is compost. We become these compost heaps that burn through, heat up and burn through and transform what we call our hindrances or our delusions or our pains or our sorrows in to clarity. In to really good soil. And when we do that, we become as Sansho says in this verse, like the golden carp, jumped out of the water in Chinese mythology and if it jumps out of the water, high enough it becomes a dragon. If it can get out of the net. In this case the net is the net of our own delusions, our own sense of hindrances, of our own doubts, of our own neurosis. If we can get out of the net of our own making, then we are like a fish jumping over the falls and getting over the top. And though exhausted, spent, we are at home and we have the feeling of being a dragon. And our clarity... our insight really does have a chance to bloom."

I really cannot express more, because it has been having such an impact on my mind. If you'd like to listen for yourself, to get the full flavor, you can hear it for free on swithpod. Maybe you are hearing better too.

Gassho,

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

The Human Route

Coming empty-handed, going empty-handed, that is human.
When you are born, where do you come from?
When you die, where do you go?
Life is like a floating cloud which appears.
Death is like a floating could which disappears.
The floating cloud itself originally does not exist.
Life and death, coming and going are also like that.
But there is one thing which always remains clear.
Is it pure and clear, not depending on life and death.
Then what is the one pure and clear thing?

Excerpt | Zen - The Perfect Companion

Decluttering Mind

If I didn't learn anything else while at Autumn Sesshin at Choboji it was the reminder that I have can have a fairly cluttered mind. And though it may not be the conscious intent of the mind, the clutter creates many problems. Over the first 3 days, I was able to see that I was carrying stuff within my mind that happened when I was a kid. Stuff that quite frankly doesn't make sense to hold on to.

One really good example is when I was about 12 or 13, I was playing over at my fathers house. I was on the street with a new bike that my father had gotten me. I stopped playing and had been sitting down watching cars go by and was basically sitting there thinking. Some kids coming through our neighborhood had been walking through, saw me with my bike. One of the boys grabbed me from behind and another punched me in the stomach and face a bunch of times. And the end result was that my bike was stolen, as well as a piece of self-esteem, because I was unable to protect myself or my bike and the ability to trust others fully.

That was something that had been tucked away in my mind, that actually had an effect on me and I didn't remember it was there, until I was there on that black cushion. The funny thing is I have dozens and more honestly hundreds of those suckers just piled up. Personally I never thought of myself as a pack-rat, but there I was at Choboji, stuck in my own bear-trap. Nowhere to run and nowhere to hide (at least easily that is-anyone who does Zazen knows what I mean by that one).

These experiences helped to create endless waves of distraction and our mind becomes so divided, that we can become a shadow of our true self. That's no fun and rather life limiting. And this shadow of our true self is my current understanding of "living like a ghost." We are not fully alive. We are not our "True" self.

For me this is where having an authentic teacher and being engaged with a Sangha become invaluable. We have people that we practice Zen with. We can come to know and bounce things off of them. It's kind of like a surrogate family, with people making an effort to perhaps move in the same direction. In a mature Sangha there is a unified field of vision, that can help cut through the static and be very useful in decluttering our mind. While at Choboji, I found an amazing level of support whihc encouraged me forward, rather than staying stuck. This kind of help and support is essential.

The guidance we can get from a Roshi, Osho, Sensei, Teacher, Spiritual Adviser can be immense. As we declutter, they can help keep us from tricking ourselves, when we are attemping to hold on to things that are really of no value.

Finally the practice of Zazen (To sit in unification), is a powerful way to declutter and get rid of those cob-webs within our mind. Sit by sit, breath by breath, is the process that we can and do use it to take out the mental "trash," so to speak. As Genjo Osho and other teachers have reminded me along the way, "This is about Life and Death," and deserves our full effort, attention and mindfulness.

The end result is that we can be lighter, clearer, more open and alive. Indeed alive.

Gassho,

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

What We Rarely Doubt

Guy Finley made an excellent point when he said, "Have you ever noticed that we never doubt a negative emotion?" Conversely that leans into the point that we can easily doubt positive emotions, circumstance or expressions.

Namaste'

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

Blog Action Day-2008!

As today's title says, it's Blog Action Day. The topic is on Poverty. Interestingly, there are different kinds of Poverty. There is the most obvious kind which is financial poverty. We see "those" poor people, avert our eyes to look away and pretend that they are not there, as we cross the street or turn away from them. It's almost as if they are like ghost and do not really exist.

But then there are these other kinds of poverty that I encounter every day that are beyond the financial poverty. I deal with people who struggle with poverty in regards to having positive emotion. They have plenty of anger, tons of rudeness, full of anxiety and general unhappiness and thrive on gossip. It's pretty sad in and of itself, because they usually don't see it, within themselves. What that usually translates into is a kind of spiritual poverty.

We can usually notice spiritual poverty in whether people are hopeful and capable of acting in a trustworthy way or not. Do they have integrity? Are they living in the problem or the solution? Do they (we) support and build each other up, or is there an attempt to extract something from you and tear us down?

If it's true, that we are all interconnected, then it matters if when people are living in emotional and/or spiritual poverty. What happens to you, happens to me. If there is a part within you that is emotionally or spiritually bankrupt - it's there within me too. It's a moral imperative that we help each other out of this poverty.

There are many ways to help others out of Emotional and Spiritual Poverty. Sometimes it's as simple as being a positive power of example, offering hope. It might be sharing a joke and a laugh, creating a gap in someone's emotional storm clouds. Other times it's just sharing simple human kindness and respect - that turns into a kind of food for the soul. It also may involved taking a stand and when people are acting in an abusive manner, walking away from them, playing it straight and say, "I care and respect you, but I don't enjoy the behavior. I choose not to enable you in this way."

Climbing out of emotional and spiritual poverty is just as (if not more) important as getting of out financial poverty. It's because when we live in that kind of poverty, it distorts how we see the world and interact with ourselves and others. Lets take one small step today and see if we can help someone out of emotional and/or spiritual poverty, even if it's just starting with ourselves. Remember, the currency of Love is kindness and compassion.

May All Beings Be Happy and Free,

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

If Nothing Changes....

"If nothing changes, nothing changes." I think about that sometimes, because it's so very true. On top of that, people usually change from pain, not when things are going so-called "right."

Change can often be a difficult process. It usually involves moving away from things that are very familiar (more often than not dysfunctional in their own way) and, taking what appears to be a "risk" of some sort. We also have the weight or habit and patterns behind us that have their own kind of momentum.

Whenever "risk," is involved you also need to have "courage, logic and determination," in there somewhere. This can help drive and guide our positive/healthy actions, which will produce the change that we are aiming for. We also have to be prepared to ask ourselves a motivating question. "what is the personal cost to ourselves, if we don't change?"

Sitting on a zafu (meditation cushion), for any period of time can have a certain clarifying effect (if we allow it). We gain a window of opportunity to see things in ourselves and our life that we may have been avoiding. Just as a side note, I find it terribly odd that we can have trouble looking ourselves in the eye on certain issues, let alone other people.

I find that there is another benefit to practicing Zazen. Over time, we have the ability to see targets more clearly. It's like something that is a thousand feet away from us, looks like it's five inches away from us. Put another way, through Zazen it can become very easy to see the path that we need to take, in order to help ourselves and others. Then the only thing that's left is just following the path (e.g. courage and determination as I mentioned before).

So yes, "if nothing changes, nothing changes." I'd rather spend my time being the person that I really want to be. It's far better than looking back and regretting that I was not the person that I could have been, because I didn't make the changes that I needed too. People who live like that are nothing more than "ghosts."

Gassho,

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

Boil

When you apply the so-called "right" amount of heat to a pot of water, at some point it will come to a boil. It works everything and is predictable. We trust the process and know this to be true, and so we make our tea or coffee every morning.

Zen practice is exactly the same way, and more specifically Zazen. By applying the practice of sitting with as a person once said, "one-pointed, undivided, stabilized mind," we can wake up. But it seems to me the key is keeping ourselves on the fire, so that as Genjo Osho says, we can "combust." That can be tough, but it is still doable.

We have a lot of distractions and turbulence that confront us every singe day. Though some may think so, Zen practice is not the absence of turbulence. The practice of Zazen has helped me to cut through it (if only just a little bit). What has been of value to finding the eye of the hurricane and stick with the practice of Zazen so that I can eventually come to a boil. It's important not to get distracted by the things that we feel are attacking or compressing us. When that happens I know that I myself can get stuck in "quicksand," and find it difficult to move in almost any direction. Being immobilized is not a [positive] answer.

If we stick with the process of Zen practice, and don't give up, I'd like to think that we will come to an "opening," where thing become clear. But the results are in proportion to the effort made. If I made a mediocre effort, I may only get a mediocre result. But as Eido Roshi used to say, Give yourself to the Dharma and the Dharma will give itself to you."

Gassho,

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

What did I Delete?

I remember an cool exercise a professor did with our class, to make a point about attention and focus. He told all of us to start with our eyes closed. When we opened our eyes, we had 30 seconds to pick out everything that was the color brown. After the 30 seconds we had to close our eyes again and keep them shut. He then asked, "tell me everything that you saw that was green?" We all strained but honestly couldn't think of anything.

The lesson was that we are "deletion creatures." If we are not paying attention or focused on something that matters to us, we delete it from our consciousness. We can often have a fairly narrow window of attention, and that is where we can get ourselves into trouble. We think that the only things that exist are what is in our narrow field of attention. We don't really consider what is outside of it.

Incidentally this is also one of the ways we can drive ourselves a little crazy. If we are focused on something going wrong, that nature of the attention expands and amplifies the object and we tend to feel our emotions more intensely. It also happens in the reverse and it would be helpful to remember this. It can sometimes add a little balance to our reactions in tough circumstances.

The practice of Zazen and "Mindfulness," can help us expand our field of vision. The more we see, the more effectively we can interact with our world. Perhaps it because we are more connected to not only ourselves but the life that's around us that it can do this.

Happiness,

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

Out of the Ruts

Since I've been back from Choboji, a lot of interesting things have been bubbling to the surface. One such item is that by going to Sesshin (translation: To gather the Mind), I was able to get outside of a rut that I hadn't recognized that I had worn myself into. I think we generally call it a "routine."

In one sense routines can prove useful. I myself like consistency. I guess there's a certain security in that. You don't have to guess what is going to happen. But then again, if we become so attached to a routine that we cannot see outside the box or find it difficult to be spontaneous, that can be a huge problem. It would be akin to being a machine and allowing the vibrance within to wither. We can end up missing out on a lot of things.

One example is every evening at Choboji, we chanted something called the "Tei Dai Denpo." This is ewhat we call a Rinzai Dharma lineage. It goes all the way back to Shakyamuni Buddha and even those before him. This is traditional and I was very used to doing it from the time I was living at Dai Bosatsu Zendo. But one night, when we entered the Zendo, there was a sheet of paper laying on our meditation cushions. It was the names of all the known female Dharma lineage holders. I was shocked. I'd never seen that done and moreover, I never considered the female Dharma lineage. It was like having blinders removed and seeing a much larger world. In other words, I was lifted out of a kind of rut I had fallen into in how I thought about the Tei Dai Denpo.

The ruts that we can potentially fall into and live in are many. If we can somehow find a way to extract ourselves from just a few, we can potentially see ourselves and live our lives in a very different way. There is a wider world for us.

So how do you get out of a rut? Simple. Just break the routine or pattern we're in. When driving home, we could take a different path, even if it's longer. Instead of just coming home and making dinner and turning on the TV, we can take a walk around the neighborhood and get some exercise and spend time with ourselves, family, friends or the kids. Instead of doing Zazen in the evening, we could do it in the morning.

There are many, many patterns that we could change in our lives. We just have to make a conscious effort to change them. And as we help ourselves by climbing out of the rut, we have an opportunity to learn something about ourselves, others and the larger world. When we get out of the ruts, we never know what you might discover that causes us to think, feel or understand differently than we did yesterday. And that is kinda cool.

May Your Life Go Well,

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

Alive in the World

I downloaded an album from iTunes called "Songs for Tibet." There are a lot of different artists on there, but one performance that really caught me was Jackson Brown's "Alive in the World." It says a lot about how I think and feel. Hope you find it a good way to start or to be a part of your day.



I want to live in the world, not inside my head
I want to live in the world, I want to stand and be counted
With the hopeful and the willing
With the open and the strong
With the voices in the darkness
Fashioning daylight out of song
And the millions of lovers
Alive in the world

I want to live in the world, not behind some wall
I want to live in the world, where I will hear if another voice should call
To the prisoner inside me
To the captive of my doubt
Who among his fantasies harbors the dream of breaking out
And taking his chances
Alive in the world

To open my eyes and wake up alive in the world
To open my eyes and fully arrive in the world

With its beauty and its cruelty
With its heartbreak and its joy
With it constantly giving birth to life and to forces that destroy
And the infinite power of change
Alive in the world

To open my eyes and wake up alive in the world
To open my eyes and fully arrive in the world
To open my eyes and wake up alive in the world
To open my eyes and fully arrive in the world

- Jackson Brown

Namaste'

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

The Choices

It's from the choices and decisions that we make today that determine the results that we have to live with later today, tomorrow, the next day and the day after that. The choices that we make are a huge responsibility, because they have ramifications not only for ourselves but others too.

As I make choices, it has become very important for me to examine the quality and motivation behind them. Without that self-examination it can be a lot easier to fool myself and make decisions that may cause me to sabotage myself or others that I'm interacting with.

Namaste'

Jaye Morris, Curator
digitalZENDO

My Excellent Choboji Adventure

Last week I attended Autumn Sesshin at Dai Bai Zan (Great Plum Mountain) Cho Bo Zenji (Listening To The Dharma Temple). It was a terrific way to close out my summer and enter a new season of change. I wanted to take the time to share some of my thoughts and feelings about my experience while there.

I'm Not With Stupid

The first thing I noticed about Choboji is not so much the temple itself, but rather the Sangha (Community of Members) that makes it up. I've been to quite a few Zen/Meditation centers and Buddhist Temples. I have to say what was very noticeable was the "warmth," of its members. No one was pretentious or "holier than thou." Everyone was respectful, direct, firm and kind. The reason why I mention this is that I've been to some temples and centers that the people seemed distant, aloof, abrupt and rude, which influenced me to feel like something "intruding," in on "their" space. You have no sense of this whatsoever at Choboji.

Each person that I encountered was incredibly supportive and helpful in their own way. Their actions influenced me to feel a deep sense of trust and comfort that only served to enhance the practice there. This might be odd to say, yet it's extremely important, because I was entrusting my sense of being and sharing our spiritual life with each other.

It was clear and obvious, that each member was a pillar of Choboji, evenly supporting the temple and each other. I and others there for the first time where invited to help out in various ways like the practice of Zazen itself and Samu (work practice). Because of this, I felt like one of the family.

Running A Marathon

Choboji itself is an amazingly beautiful place. The space works well in all aspects. It's a heck of a place to run a spiritual marathon of unswerving Zen practice. Attention to detail and mindfulness is present everywhere. Looking back over my shoulder and reflecting on my experience, it's interesting to experience how well thought-out and organized everything is there. This is a *real* hallmark of maturity in a temple. My mind was able to reflexively relax. Nothing was out of place. The physical structure and environment over the entire campus was as supportive to me as the Sangha members.

In running this marathon you have to start early. That means being in the Zendo by 5:00am, to get things going. The activites are well mapped out. It's authentic Zen in training, top to bottom - in sound, voice, sitting and tone.

What was really nice is that dokusan (private interview with the teacher (Abbot) was offered twice daily. Teisho (place where the truth is) was also offered daily (more on that later). The Zazen (seated meditation) itself ranged in terms of time frame, but was completely doable. As mentioned before, we did about an hour and a half of work practice. What is really great is the relationship Choboji has with other organizations in Seattle. We got to work at an very spacious Japanese Garden. This proved to be an excellent environment for meditative practice was well. I also got to see first hand how a Koi could leap out of the water and become a dragon. If you get to see them, you will understand.

Food for Thought

I have to make a special note to you about diet at Choboji. Food is fuel and helps to sustain our practice. This is especially when you are running a marathon. To sum up the overall meals which there is simple. They rocked the house. The "Tenzo" and "Assistant-Tenzo," did an amazing job. I've had terrible experiences in the past with people who did not know how to prepare vegetarian meals well and tend to be careful. The food at Choboji really was "flawless victory."

Ed and Dee where really incredible. There was an amazing variety to the meals and yet consistently solid. The only thing that troubled me was that I wish they had a cookbook or something, so that I could continue on that aspect of the path when I came home. Perhaps only parents can appreciate the point when I say, If my kids had been there, they would have happily eaten the meals (and my girls are tough as ninja's when it comes to food).

Clear Quiet Clean

I want to preface this final part with some very down to earth talk. I've practiced Zen seriously for almost 18 years. I have read well over 150-200 books on Buddhism and spirituality and have been to a good number or Meditation centers and temples. I have also interfaced with or heard a fair number of teachers. The reason that I mention this is to say, if it's possible, I have a pretty wide frame of reference to draw upon.

My experience with Genjo Marinello Osho is easy to express. He is the condensed version of everything that is Choboji. Authentic, warm, articulate, direct, intimate, down-to-earth, anti-muddy intellectually-mentally and spiritually. His teisho's terrific. You can hear the podcasts (for free), but to see them live is a new level to the experience. They are definitely something to see. His communication skills are extraordinary.

Genjo Osho's attention to detail was nothing sort of staggering. His guidance during practice was not somewhere up in the ether or clouds, aloof and abstract, but deeply embedded and grounded. I always had the feeling that he was speaking directly into my heart and not around or over my head. On several occasions he offered direct correction and help to my siting posture. Like I said, in sesshin you are running a marathon. It's important to pace yourself correctly and have good posture and habits so you can complete the run. I really found that helpful.

I cannot conclude this article without mentioning The Vice-abbot, Genko Osho. She is a wonderful treasure in and of herself. I was able to experience a teisho with her that I found heartening and encouraging. She radiates a strength and dignity that is beautiful and disarming. Of special note, she preformed a Japanese Tea ceremony for the participants midway though the sesshin that definitely hit the mark with me.

Conclusion

During a teisho early in the Sesshin, Genjo Osho made a statement, that really penetrated my heart. He said, "Do not let this sacrifice, [that it took to come here to this Sesshin] go to waste." There was not just giving a week of my time to go practice. It's also the sacrifice of those who I trained with. There is the sacrifice that their significant others and/or families made. There is the sacrifice that Debra and my children made, to go an entire week, with me not being physically present. I am intensely grateful for that. And I can only fully express that gratitude properly, be how I live This life.

Gassho,

Jaye Morris, Curator
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