Meditation in Japanese

Again, this is an older post, from mid June, that I didn't get around to posting until now.

This week, I visited Koyasan- this incredibly beautiful tableland in the center of Japan. It’s amazing. Just getting there is crazy. You’re on this railroad that travels, literally, on the tree tops. I’m not exaggerating. We really were at the level of the tree tops. It was weird. I was wondering how they built it. We were up so high and we were on a train, like, someone built these tracks, way up here. And there was a train, an electric train, with people on it, traveling, through the tree tops. I suppose it must have just been built really tall a long time ago and the trees have grown up around it but that doesn’t matter. The end result is that you are traveling through the tops of trees on a train. And that’s just getting there.
Once you get there, it’s like temple town. Apparently, some monk asked for a place to set up and develop the practice of Shingon Buddhism and I think some emperor said “Here, take this land, that should work for you.” And I think it did because the kind of practice they do is actually out in the forest and I think it’s related to nature because the third level of their meditation is picturing the moon and themselves as no longer separate from each other. Either way, the town is filled with temples and they’re all beautiful and they’re all out in nature.
I was fortunate enough to stay at Eko In, this really cool temple run by young monks. Also, I got the best room in the house (the monk even told me so). My room was in the trees, facing the meditation hall. All I could see was trees and I got to sleep with my window open and no one could look in to my room and I had it all to myself and oh- it was absolute heaven. Oh! And don’t even get me started on the food, that was served in our room, and so good!









Anyway, if you ever go to Japan, go to Koyasan, ask to stay at Eko In, and ask for room 5 (ask two weeks in advance to make sure you can stay there).

Now, the reason I actually chose to stay at Eko In in particular was because the Lonely Planet guide had said that they were one of two temples that offered meditation instruction. I thought it would be cool to meditate with the monks there and I assumed it would be meditation like we do at the zen center: first thing in the morning, silent, bow to your cushion, listen for a bell, etc.
It wasn’t. It was at 4:30 in the afternoon. The day that I was there, they actually had a guy who spoke English so we got meditation instruction, and this is how it went (at least, this is how I remember it)

In our practice, Ajikan meditation, we focus on the Sanskrit letter “A” (and he pointed to the Sanskrit letter that was on a sort of small scroll-like thing in the center of the room, and he said Ah). The letter “A” is the first sound that humans utter (mama, papa) and without it, there would be no speech.
He talked a little more about the significance of the letter “A”, about the meaning of the other symbols on the scroll, and three levels of Ajikan and how they help you to reach enlightenment. Then he explained that we would only be doing the first level today. He asked us to sit seiza and to bow to the Buddha image.  
Then he gave the simplest instruction in meditation I have ever seen (now that I think about it, it was kind of like the fukanzazengi):

First, sit down, without your cushion (and he sat, with his legs spread wide).

Next, you bend your left leg, like this (and he took his left leg and bent it so that his foot was touching his inner right thigh).

Then you take your right leg and you place it on your left thigh, like this (and he bent his right leg and lifted up his foot and put it on his thigh).

Now, I have to stop here for a moment.
I’ve never wanted to sit lotus anything- no desire, no need, nothing. Both my teacher at the zen center and my yoga teacher have attempted to help me sit half lotus and, when faced with what my legs do when I attempt it, have backed off of that notion. But when this guy said what he said, I just did it. I actually put my leg in half lotus position. It hurt my ankle a little bit and my right knee was about two inches off the ground but I did it. It was so simple, who wouldn’t?

Next he said that your knees and buttocks must be grounded to the floor and so you use the cushion to help you (and we all grabbed our cushions and put them underneath us and that helped).
Then he showed us how to do the cosmic mudra.
Then he said that our back should not be stiff, like this- and he sat up all rigid and tall. Instead he explained that we must tilt our pelvis out, forward, that it must be stiff but that our belly, should hang down, relax. He reminded us again that our pelvis should be stiff and straight but then we should relax our shoulders and chest. Then he told us to place our head on our spine.
He told us our eyes should not be open or closed. If they are open, they are distracted by the world around us. If they are closed, they are distracted by the things inside us. So, we keep them halfway between the two (and he demonstrated lids half closed).

Then he told us how to breathe:
The first three breaths, you breathe in through your nose as slow and long as you can, then out through your mouth as slow and long as you can. Do this for the first three breaths. After that, you should breathe regular, but you should count: in…out 1, in…out 2, and keep going until you get to 10. When you get to 10, go back to 1. You should not go past ten. We like to count and think we are good or bad but that is not good for meditation so we stop at ten, and go back to 1.

Then he explained about thoughts:
If you think thoughts, you should not say “I am bad for thinking thoughts” or “Don’t think thoughts.” Instead, think of that thought as a leaf on a tree and try to see the whole tree. If we only see the leaf, we get stuck but if we picture a whole forest, we can let go.

Then he got up and said, “I’ll be back later,” and left.
It was hard not to laugh at that comment. I wanted to say “You’ve got some zen in you after all… later indeed, guess we’ll just stop when we stop…”
But I didn’t, I actually started counting. I’ve never counted before, it never worked for me, but that day, I tried it, and it worked- it kept me focused on my breath. Of course, I totally kept count of how many sets of ten I did, 3, and I did lose track a couple of times but mostly, I just counted my breath, in and out, and sat there- half lotus- who knew this was all it would take?

After about 30 minutes a bell sounded, somewhere in temple town, and then some very cheezy music that sounded like the music they play when they show a tranquil jungle in cartoons started playing but the guy didn’t show up. I wondered if these sounds were just random or if they were an intended distraction or if the guy was running late- but then I went back to counting.
Then I heard footsteps and he apparently walked back in the room. He then had us sway our bodies from side to side about 5 times, then from front to back. Then he had us do this cool thing with our hands. He told us to lift our hands up toward our face, palms facing our face. Then he had us trace them down the front of our body, but not touching, then over our legs and finally to the floor- pushing away anything that had come up. We did this two more times. It was kind of a nice way to end our meditation, like we were cleansing ourselves.
Then he explained that enlightenment can take a long time but that meditation can help you to control your emotions, maybe not get so angry or upset. He said that you can do it three minutes, five minutes, ten minutes- however long you want- just take a breath and it may help.
Then we sat seiza again, bowed to the Buddha again, and class was over.