I had a difficult dokusan. It's the first time I've ever had that. I've had awkward dokusans, dokusans where I didn't know what I was doing, dokusans where I was scared, but all of those dokusans were me, being weird, and they always ended up being enlightening later. This dokusan was different, it felt bad from the beginning, and it wasn't just me.
I showed up...late. I was so late that my teacher thought I wasn't coming. But I didn't know that when I got there. All I knew was that the only shoes outside the door were my teacher's, which meant that the person before me had finished and left. But I didn't know how long ago they had left, I didn't know if my teacher had rung his bell for me and I wasn't there, all I knew was that my teacher was now walking out of his office, toward his shoes.
As I approached the door to his office he asked, "And you are?"
I told him my name and asked if I should wait in the waiting area for him to ring the bell or if I should just come on in.
He hesitated, turned to walk back in to his office, then turned back toward me, then turned back to go back in to his office and said, "Come in..."
I stepped in and stood in the corner of his office, with my hands in shashu, attempting to be present to him as he relit the candle on his altar. As I watched him, it all came together for me: he must have met with his first student and finished before I had gotten there. Then he had rung his bell to let me know he was ready, and I hadn't answered. At one point, he must have decided that I wasn't coming, had blown out the candle on his altar, and proceeded on his way down to the ceremony in the courtyard.
Then I had shown up.
And when I showed up, I didn't apologize for being late. I simply told him my name and asked if I should wait in the waiting area or come in.
He must have wanted to say, "Uh, you already missed that opportunity- I already rang for you and you weren't there." But he didn't, he just said, "Come in."
As this occurred to me, I wanted to shrink. I wanted to be as small as possible, I wanted to do everything in my power to make this better, to not make him sit across from me when he wanted to go to the ceremony.
But all he had said was "Come in." He hadn't said I was late, he hadn't said that he was on his way to the ceremony, he had just said come in, and now he was sitting down.
I waited as he sat down and adjusted his robes. As he was adjusting his okesa, he motioned for me to proceed, to approach him and begin my three prostrations.
It was painful. I was trying to be present to him to do the prostrations in good form, but I was also trying to be present to dokusan. For me, the first three prostrations are about giving in, about clearing my mind of thoughts, about being open and receiving of what my teacher has to say instead of trying to hold on to it, to try to insert myself into it. So I was trying to do that, to clear my mind, to give in to dokusan. But at the same time, all I could think about was the fact that he couldn't go to the ceremony because of me, that he probably thought that I knew I was late and hadn't apologized, that I was all clueless and happy while he was sitting there, missing a ceremony, because I was late.
By the third prostration, I made up my mind to just ask him, to just put out there this thing that I felt was between us. I finished the prostrations and sat down on my cushion. I adjusted my posture, put my hands in the mudra position, and took a deep breath. Then I looked up at him and said, "Good morning" (this is the first time that I've actually said it first).
"Good morning," he responded.
I cocked my head to the said and asked, "Can I ask you a question?"
He paused. I imagine it took all of his patience to not say, "This is dokusan. The whole point of it is to ask questions. Are you actually asking me if you can ask me a question?"
Instead, he nodded slightly and said, "Yes."
I pointed my thumb to the window that opened on to the courtyard where the ceremony was taking place.
"Do you want to go to the ceremony? Because I can meet with you another time... I can reschedule..." I stopped short of saying 'Because, pretty much, the last thing I want to do is have a dokusan with you that is keeping you from doing something you want. I would much rather wait two months and have one where I'm not making you miss something.'
He answered, "When I thought you weren't coming, I did. But you're here now, so we might as well..." and I think he swept his hand across his body, gesturing for me to proceed.
"We might as well!" I thought. What kind of a way is that to start dokusan? I'm supposed to talk now? I'm supposed to share with you about what's coming up for me... because you have to? Because I made it before you walked out the door? Because you have no other choice in the matter? I have no interest in this, in talking to you when you don't want to be here. This is, by far, the absolute last thing I want to be doing to you right now.
But I couldn't argue or leave or suggest that we don't meet. I had honestly asked him if he wanted to go to the ceremony. He had honestly answered that he did. And he had also said that we should meet anyway. I couldn't second guess that or tell him what he should do- all I could do was receive what he had just offered to do: have dokusan with me.
And so I started talking, but all I could think about was this idea that he wanted to be somewhere else, that my words and time were a block, keeping him from attending the ceremony. I talked some more, shared what was going on with me, and then... the sound of chanting came up from the courtyard.
"f#@ me!" I thought to myself. "There's the damn ceremony- there's this reminder, of what he is missing, just showing up, sticking its face into your dokusan, just reminding you, and him, that he's NOT there."
And it kept up this way- the sound of the ceremony carried through the window and provided the backdrop for my entire dokusan. At one point, I could hear them asking for poems and I wondered if he was sad about not hearing them, or if maybe he was trying to hear them.
And then the ceremony was over, and I could hear the work meeting, and I could hear them asking for help for the One Day Sit and that's when I had to stop. I just couldn't take it anymore. It was so real, it was so present, it was impossible for me to think about my practice and what was coming up for me with actual people having an actual work meeting, and knowing that neither of us were there for it.
So I stopped talking, looked down, and took a ton of breaths to just get back in touch with what was coming up for me, what was actually coming up for me, right then.
But all that was coming up for me was, "Should I apologize for being late? Should I explain to him why I was late? Is he offended that I didn't apologize?"
And then I thought to myself, "Should I tell him that? Should I tell him how I'm feeling right now?"
But then I thought that was lame. I thought it was lame to bring him into my drama about being late. And I thought about myself. What was it about me that needed him to know that I hadn't been late on purpose? What was it that I wanted him to know about me?
And then I thought, "No, that's not what I want him to know about me. I already know that I'm not late. I already know that I'm not the kind of person who would show up late for dokusan. I don't need him to know that about me- that's something that I'm secure in. If he doesn't know that, there's nothing I can do about that."
And then I thought about just ending it right there- just letting it be over so that he could get on with his day. But at that point, the ceremony was over, so me ending it wasn't going to solve the problem of him missing the ceremony, it was over anyway.
And then I realized that this was my dokusan, that I probably wouldn't see him for another two months, and I felt like I had missed this opportunity, that I hadn't said all the things that I wanted to and how sad I was about that.
But then I thought about not grasping at dokusan, about not trying to make dokusan into a certain thing, and then I got even sadder, because I had come in to dokusan that morning with the intent to just talk about my practice, and how I actually had had things to say but that instead, I had just hobbled along, barely saying those things I had thought of but not really feeling them because all I could think about was the ceremony and whether or not my teacher was mad at me for being late.
After what felt like a long while, I settled enough to look up, at my teacher.
He was smiling.
I was encouraged by this. I wondered if he was proud of me for settling, for taking a breath. And so I started talking, about my practice, still a little feebly, but making it through.
We talked some more, and I still considered telling him how I was feeling right then and there, how difficult this was for me. I also reconsidered telling him about the whole late thing, but finally decided against it.
And then I felt like I was done, and so I stopped talking, and looked at him. And then he started talking, and I listened. And then I thought we were done again, and so I stopped talking, and looked at him, and he talked again. I wondered if he was doing this on purpose, if he knew this was hard for me, if he saw that I wanted to continue but didn't have it in me and so he was talking to keep it going, until I was actually done.
And then at one point, my occupation with explaining about being late changed to feeling of gratitude to him, for meeting with me, when he could have gone to the ceremony instead. And that felt nice. That felt like something I would be fine sharing with him. And then I noticed that too- that I was only willing to share with him what was coming up for me when it made me look good, when it was pleasant and harmonious.
Shortly after that, I think we both knew that it was done, and so we bowed to each other.
And then I bowed again, and said, "Thank you, for meeting with me, when you wanted to go to the ceremony."
"You're welcome," he said. And then he said that it was like we had been at the ceremony anyway.
I joked about it being "satellite participation" and he said that it felt like the ceremony came up to meet us, that we were a part of it.
Of course, I didn't feel this at all. I was haunted by the damn ceremony, taunted by it, it felt like a constant reminder of how much of a burden my dokusan had been. But my teacher seemed fine with it, so maybe he actually did get to attend the ceremony, in a whole new way.
After dokusan, I felt pretty bad. I felt like it was a total bummer of a dokusan. I felt like I hadn't been myself, hadn't been present, hadn't said the things I wanted to and hadn't even been able to express what was coming up in the moment when it actually happened. I analyzed myself in dokusan, tried to pick apart what had worked and what hadn't. I also tried to forget dokusan, to let it go, to let what happened to just be what happened. But every time I tried to do that, it just kept coming up- all day long and into the next morning. And every time it came up, I found myself trying to say things that I hadn't, wishing that I had said things to my teacher, wishing that I had explained myself better. I began to wonder if what had upset me in dokusan was the fact that I had stifled myself, that I hadn't been forthcoming, that I hadn't been willing to just be honest, to be myself with him.
I spoke with a friend about it and they sympathized with me: about being late without meaning to, about keeping my teacher from attending the ceremony, about the awkwardness of the entire situation. That made me feel better, to hear that it really was difficult, that it really is hard when you do that to your teacher, intentionally or not. And then later, she sent me an email, explaining that my dokusan experience was actually pretty common. She said that we all have awkward dokusans, that teachers and students often struggle with having such an intimate interchange in such a short time and under different circumstances. This helped too.
But it wasn't until mid- day the next day that I finally got some clarity around it. I was reliving it again in my mind, saying the things that I wished I had said and I imagined my teacher saying "Oh! Is that what happened? Why didn't you say that?" and then having him smile, and our dokusan being perfect and harmonious, from that point on.
And that's when I realized that all I really wanted, was a pleasant dokusan. It wasn't so much that I needed to express myself, it was more that I didn't like it when there was discomfort between us- when I thought he might be mad at me, or that we didn't get along.
And then I said to myself, "It's okay to have an unpleasant dokusan. You're not always going to get along with your teacher, you're not always going to see eye to eye. Your doksuan can be difficult and awkward. You are two people, trying to meet, and things can happen that set you off. And both of you will respond to them the best you can, and you will continue. That's what happened today. It was awkward, it was difficult, and in the end, you felt grateful to him, for staying. And in the end, he was smiling, and noticing that he attended the ceremony anyway. And that was all- you made it through, you stayed, and so did he."
And that's when I was able to let it go- when I accepted that my dokusan was difficult- it just was. It wasn't me, it wasn't him, it was the things that happened and how we responded to them. And that allowed me to see the other parts of dokusan- that we both had stayed, that he had smiled at me, that I had genuinely felt grateful to him and expressed it, and that we had experienced this, together.
Wednesday, September 23, 2020
Fear of dokusan
I have to say that I was actually fine going to dokusan this time. I had had an unsettling last dokusan, but as a result had finally come to understand that dokusan was actually all about you. Your teacher could only respond to what you offered about yourself and often, it wasn't what they said, it was what you responded to that made dokusan what it was. It was totally up to you to make dokusan what it was and, honestly, it really was all about you- you shared yourself with your teacher and they responded. When I had done that (just shared myself) in my last dokusan, though it had been unsettling, it had been so because I was finally looking at myself.
So I knew that, honestly, all I had to do was show up for dokusan and share with my teacher what was coming up for me. I also knew that, honestly, dokusan was going to be whatever I made it- it had no affect on my teacher, his evaluation of me, his acceptance of me, etc. All of this was just for me. I suppose you could say your teacher is just along for the ride but I think they play a little bigger role than that. Still, I really knew that dokusan was for my benefit, no one else's.
And then it actually was the morning that I was going to dokusan. And then I was in the building and it was 15 minutes away. And then I had to go upstairs...and I got a little scared.
See, I sprained my ankle a week ago so I have to sit in a chair. I had asked my teacher's assistant about this, whether or not I could sit dokusan with my teacher if I were in a chair, and she said it was no problem, I could just grab a chair from the hallway.
I laughed at the nonchalance of this response- just grab a chair- and then worried about how I was going to get a chair into the dokusan office: were there even chairs in the hallway? What if someone was sitting on them? Can you put a chair on the tatami mats? And what's the order of things when you bring a chair into the room- do you do prostrations first? Where does the chair go while you do the prostrations? I finally ended up just acting out the situation in my bedroom at home, and came up with a plan for how to bring the chair into the room. But then I got worried about the dokusan waiting area- what if there wasn't a chair there? I had been told that at my time slot, there were people ahead of me and so I might have to wait and I wondered how long I could tolerate sitting on the floor with my ankle. I figured I'd just sit in a chair if I had to but then I worried about the bell- how would I ring back to my teacher if I weren't sitting next to the bell?
I got into the building, gingerly walked up the steps, bowed to Suzuki Roshi, and peered around the corner. There were fancy shoes outside my teacher's door so I knew someone was in with him. I spied chairs in the hallway and figured I could sit on them to wait but then, as I approached the waiting area I saw... a chair! I wasn't sure if it had been put there for me or not but I was grateful for it anyway.
I sat down, settled in, and as I leaned forward in the chair, I got mad.
"This isn't fair," I thought. "Before I sprained my ankle, I was totally leaning forward. I had actually done what he said in last dokusan and now, he's going to tell me again to tilt my hips forward and stick my chest out but I already know how to do that. It's not fair that it's going to look like I haven't made any progress when I've made total progress. And I worked hard for this progress. I trained myself to lean forward so much that someone actually adjusted me backward so I know I got it right."
And then I took a deep breath, and tried to feel my breath move through my body: belly, abdomen, chest... chest, abdomen, belly. I worried again about my posture but then reminded myself that it was about me, not about posture, it was about breathing, freely.
After a couple of minutes, I started to worry. I wondered if I had been squeezed in to the schedule, if the person before me had just started, if they would finish right before lunch and he'd have to see me during his lunch. I decided that I would be brief, that I would only ask what was necessary, and started to plan what I would say.
"Nope," I stopped myself. "That's not what this is about. You say what comes up for you, not what you think you should say. Let it be, let it happen."
But then I was still sitting there, worrying about being a burden to him, making him see me. I started picturing him, seeing me bring in that chair, being annoyed with me for having a sprained ankle again, thinking I was a woosie for not being able to tolerate sitting on the floor with him for dokusan. I tried to breathe again, to focus on my breath, but noticed how scared I was.
"Wow," I thought. "You're actually scared of dokusan. Are you afraid he's going to ask you questions that will unsettle you again?"
And I thought about that- about how I had handled the questions and that didn't frighten me. I remembered how, even though they were unsettling, I had maintained eye contact, met my teacher, been myself, and hadn't felt afraid. But still, I definitely felt afraid.
"What is this?" I asked myself. "What is it you're afraid of?"
"Rejection," I answered. "You're afraid he's going to reject you. You're afraid he's going to think you haven't worked hard enough or that by just showing up and being present you're not putting in enough effort..."
I started to interrupt myself, "But he isn't rejecting you, he won't do that..."
But then I interrupt myself again, "Don't excuse this, don't explain it, just feel it, actually feel this fear."
And so I did. I said to myself, "This is fear, this is fear of rejection." And it was weird, as soon as I felt it, my shoulders dropped and I felt little and light and safe.
"See," I said. "That's all it was.. fear. It just needed to be seen. You're fine now."
And I went back to breathing but I still felt scared.
And then I rationalized it. "Of course you're scared. You were unsettled last time. You're afraid of what he might say this time. You're just a frightened little student, that's all," and I met myself with compassion. "It's okay to be afraid."
"It's okay to be afraid?" I asked myself, incredulously. "Fear is okay?" I asked, surprised by this notion.
"Fear is an emotion, just like happy is an emotion, they're just emotions. And you are a feeling person, you just are. And right now you are feeling- just feeling, that's all."
And then I pictured myself, going in to dokusan, being frightened like I had been so many times before. But then I remembered how I had been last time, how I had been confident, how I had been myself without question or doubt.
"I don't want to be afraid this time. I don't want to cower or worry in dokusan. I want to just be in dokusan, and I can do that. I've done that. And my teacher isn't judging me or rejecting me- I'm the only one who's making this fear, and I don't have to."
And then someone walked up, and sat down, and I worried that they had been in front of me in the schedule and that they were upset that now they had to wait for me and I wondered who was supposed to go first and so I looked at my watch. It was past the time that I had been scheduled so I knew they weren't supposed to be there before me but still, I felt bad, and decided again what I really needed to ask in dokusan.
"Okay, remember to ask..." but that question was a question of convenience, of technicality, it wasn't actually what I was noticing in my practice. "I know you want to ask that but that's not what's coming up. You can only say what's coming up and you won't know what's coming up until you get there."
Fortunately, about two minutes later, the bell rang, and I rang back. I saw my good friend, who I hadn't seen in a long time, coming out and sitting down on the chair in the hallway. I bowed to her and she smiled huge back at me but I was so focused on getting the chair into the office I just pointed to it and said, "I need the chair..." and she hurriedly got out of it and gave it to me.
I stepped into the room and did the forms that I had practiced for bringing in the chair. Instead of being met with a look of annoyance, I was met by my teacher immediately removing the cushion so that I'd have a place to put the chair. I did three prostrations, put the chair on the zafu, settled into my posture, looked up, and said good morning. He pointed to my ankle and asked, with a with a tone of both curiosity and care, "What happened?"
I told him about it, how frustrated I was with it, what I was going to do about it, and though I shouldn't have been surprised by this, he met me with tenderness and confidence. And then we moved on.
I shared what I had been noticing about myself- in my relationships with my extended and immediate family, in my willingness to let things happen, in my social interactions in the zendo, and in my response to seeing myself. He shared some anecdotes from his own life, some perspectives on life in general and how we often respond to them. I asked some questions for clarification which led to other sharing about what was coming up for me. Some of his answers brought up stuff in me and I let it- I think we both saw the associations of my life with the questions I was asking about others- both saw that I was experiencing that too.
And then, it was weird, I felt like I had been seen. We had only talked about the two things that I had been curious about in my practice, just those two things. They weren't questions, they weren't things I had felt unsettled about, they were just what I had noticed, and shared. But we had looked at them, together I guess, talked about them, and that was all. It wasn't like I was settled around them now or had some new way to be- just that we had seen them, within the lens of this practice, within the joy and beauty of this practice, and we had connected- or, at least, I felt connected- because I had shared. And I felt done. I felt like saying thank you, and bowing, because I was grateful, and feeling met.
But something in the conversation lead me to something else- something I had been meaning to ask and had planned to bring up at his next Q and A but there it was, coming up, so I asked it- and then suggested we could talk about it at length another time. Instead, he offered a brief answer, which was extremely helpful, and gave me the tools that I needed to begin to help my friend.
And then my teacher bowed. Somehow he knew it was over too (or maybe he didn't, maybe it was time for lunch). I stood up and moved the chair so that I could do three full prostrations. He said I could do three standing bows instead, so I did. And then I bowed to the door, opened it, returned the chair to the hallway, and went home.
So I knew that, honestly, all I had to do was show up for dokusan and share with my teacher what was coming up for me. I also knew that, honestly, dokusan was going to be whatever I made it- it had no affect on my teacher, his evaluation of me, his acceptance of me, etc. All of this was just for me. I suppose you could say your teacher is just along for the ride but I think they play a little bigger role than that. Still, I really knew that dokusan was for my benefit, no one else's.
And then it actually was the morning that I was going to dokusan. And then I was in the building and it was 15 minutes away. And then I had to go upstairs...and I got a little scared.
See, I sprained my ankle a week ago so I have to sit in a chair. I had asked my teacher's assistant about this, whether or not I could sit dokusan with my teacher if I were in a chair, and she said it was no problem, I could just grab a chair from the hallway.
I laughed at the nonchalance of this response- just grab a chair- and then worried about how I was going to get a chair into the dokusan office: were there even chairs in the hallway? What if someone was sitting on them? Can you put a chair on the tatami mats? And what's the order of things when you bring a chair into the room- do you do prostrations first? Where does the chair go while you do the prostrations? I finally ended up just acting out the situation in my bedroom at home, and came up with a plan for how to bring the chair into the room. But then I got worried about the dokusan waiting area- what if there wasn't a chair there? I had been told that at my time slot, there were people ahead of me and so I might have to wait and I wondered how long I could tolerate sitting on the floor with my ankle. I figured I'd just sit in a chair if I had to but then I worried about the bell- how would I ring back to my teacher if I weren't sitting next to the bell?
I got into the building, gingerly walked up the steps, bowed to Suzuki Roshi, and peered around the corner. There were fancy shoes outside my teacher's door so I knew someone was in with him. I spied chairs in the hallway and figured I could sit on them to wait but then, as I approached the waiting area I saw... a chair! I wasn't sure if it had been put there for me or not but I was grateful for it anyway.
I sat down, settled in, and as I leaned forward in the chair, I got mad.
"This isn't fair," I thought. "Before I sprained my ankle, I was totally leaning forward. I had actually done what he said in last dokusan and now, he's going to tell me again to tilt my hips forward and stick my chest out but I already know how to do that. It's not fair that it's going to look like I haven't made any progress when I've made total progress. And I worked hard for this progress. I trained myself to lean forward so much that someone actually adjusted me backward so I know I got it right."
And then I took a deep breath, and tried to feel my breath move through my body: belly, abdomen, chest... chest, abdomen, belly. I worried again about my posture but then reminded myself that it was about me, not about posture, it was about breathing, freely.
After a couple of minutes, I started to worry. I wondered if I had been squeezed in to the schedule, if the person before me had just started, if they would finish right before lunch and he'd have to see me during his lunch. I decided that I would be brief, that I would only ask what was necessary, and started to plan what I would say.
"Nope," I stopped myself. "That's not what this is about. You say what comes up for you, not what you think you should say. Let it be, let it happen."
But then I was still sitting there, worrying about being a burden to him, making him see me. I started picturing him, seeing me bring in that chair, being annoyed with me for having a sprained ankle again, thinking I was a woosie for not being able to tolerate sitting on the floor with him for dokusan. I tried to breathe again, to focus on my breath, but noticed how scared I was.
"Wow," I thought. "You're actually scared of dokusan. Are you afraid he's going to ask you questions that will unsettle you again?"
And I thought about that- about how I had handled the questions and that didn't frighten me. I remembered how, even though they were unsettling, I had maintained eye contact, met my teacher, been myself, and hadn't felt afraid. But still, I definitely felt afraid.
"What is this?" I asked myself. "What is it you're afraid of?"
"Rejection," I answered. "You're afraid he's going to reject you. You're afraid he's going to think you haven't worked hard enough or that by just showing up and being present you're not putting in enough effort..."
I started to interrupt myself, "But he isn't rejecting you, he won't do that..."
But then I interrupt myself again, "Don't excuse this, don't explain it, just feel it, actually feel this fear."
And so I did. I said to myself, "This is fear, this is fear of rejection." And it was weird, as soon as I felt it, my shoulders dropped and I felt little and light and safe.
"See," I said. "That's all it was.. fear. It just needed to be seen. You're fine now."
And I went back to breathing but I still felt scared.
And then I rationalized it. "Of course you're scared. You were unsettled last time. You're afraid of what he might say this time. You're just a frightened little student, that's all," and I met myself with compassion. "It's okay to be afraid."
"It's okay to be afraid?" I asked myself, incredulously. "Fear is okay?" I asked, surprised by this notion.
"Fear is an emotion, just like happy is an emotion, they're just emotions. And you are a feeling person, you just are. And right now you are feeling- just feeling, that's all."
And then I pictured myself, going in to dokusan, being frightened like I had been so many times before. But then I remembered how I had been last time, how I had been confident, how I had been myself without question or doubt.
"I don't want to be afraid this time. I don't want to cower or worry in dokusan. I want to just be in dokusan, and I can do that. I've done that. And my teacher isn't judging me or rejecting me- I'm the only one who's making this fear, and I don't have to."
And then someone walked up, and sat down, and I worried that they had been in front of me in the schedule and that they were upset that now they had to wait for me and I wondered who was supposed to go first and so I looked at my watch. It was past the time that I had been scheduled so I knew they weren't supposed to be there before me but still, I felt bad, and decided again what I really needed to ask in dokusan.
"Okay, remember to ask..." but that question was a question of convenience, of technicality, it wasn't actually what I was noticing in my practice. "I know you want to ask that but that's not what's coming up. You can only say what's coming up and you won't know what's coming up until you get there."
Fortunately, about two minutes later, the bell rang, and I rang back. I saw my good friend, who I hadn't seen in a long time, coming out and sitting down on the chair in the hallway. I bowed to her and she smiled huge back at me but I was so focused on getting the chair into the office I just pointed to it and said, "I need the chair..." and she hurriedly got out of it and gave it to me.
I stepped into the room and did the forms that I had practiced for bringing in the chair. Instead of being met with a look of annoyance, I was met by my teacher immediately removing the cushion so that I'd have a place to put the chair. I did three prostrations, put the chair on the zafu, settled into my posture, looked up, and said good morning. He pointed to my ankle and asked, with a with a tone of both curiosity and care, "What happened?"
I told him about it, how frustrated I was with it, what I was going to do about it, and though I shouldn't have been surprised by this, he met me with tenderness and confidence. And then we moved on.
I shared what I had been noticing about myself- in my relationships with my extended and immediate family, in my willingness to let things happen, in my social interactions in the zendo, and in my response to seeing myself. He shared some anecdotes from his own life, some perspectives on life in general and how we often respond to them. I asked some questions for clarification which led to other sharing about what was coming up for me. Some of his answers brought up stuff in me and I let it- I think we both saw the associations of my life with the questions I was asking about others- both saw that I was experiencing that too.
And then, it was weird, I felt like I had been seen. We had only talked about the two things that I had been curious about in my practice, just those two things. They weren't questions, they weren't things I had felt unsettled about, they were just what I had noticed, and shared. But we had looked at them, together I guess, talked about them, and that was all. It wasn't like I was settled around them now or had some new way to be- just that we had seen them, within the lens of this practice, within the joy and beauty of this practice, and we had connected- or, at least, I felt connected- because I had shared. And I felt done. I felt like saying thank you, and bowing, because I was grateful, and feeling met.
But something in the conversation lead me to something else- something I had been meaning to ask and had planned to bring up at his next Q and A but there it was, coming up, so I asked it- and then suggested we could talk about it at length another time. Instead, he offered a brief answer, which was extremely helpful, and gave me the tools that I needed to begin to help my friend.
And then my teacher bowed. Somehow he knew it was over too (or maybe he didn't, maybe it was time for lunch). I stood up and moved the chair so that I could do three full prostrations. He said I could do three standing bows instead, so I did. And then I bowed to the door, opened it, returned the chair to the hallway, and went home.
Part 2- The truth of your teacher
I was doing dishes in my kitchen, trying to decide what to
do next, and then heard myself ask myself to make the decision based on love:
which action would involve meeting my relatives with love?
“Darnit!” I thought. “I’m doing it!”
See, a couple of nights before, I had been listening to a
dharma talk on line in which my teacher had asked the people in the audience to
think about what had brought them to practice. He asked them to think of the
simple answer, the one that came to mind first, not necessarily the right
answer or the one that sounded good. My answer was love, which I was okay
with, which actually sounded quite accurate to my experience with practice.
But then he asked us to consider what it would be like if we
based our actions on this intention- if we acted in a way that met this
intention, that this intention guided or motivated our every act throughout our
daily lives (or something to that effect).
When I heard that part, I kind of freaked out. “No way,” I
thought. “That’s too scary. I can’t always act out of love. I’ll be too
vulnerable. I’ll be in uncharted territory. I’ll be helped by others, involved
with others, I can’t base all of my interactions on love- that’s a little too
much.”
And then, of course, the very next day, I heard myself
asking myself, when in a place of decision, Are you responding to this person
with love? If so, then do it, if not, then don’t. And for the
most part, I was okay with that too.
But then this morning, when I heard myself doing it, I got
kind of pissed off.
“How does he do
that?” I asked myself. “How does my teacher say these things that I hear but refuse to do and then, later, end up doing without even meaning to?
How come what he says, I do, even when I don’t want to do them? Why am I doing
this?”
And then I answered myself, “Because it’s the truth. It’s
coming up and you’re acting it not because it’s right or it’s wrong but because
it’s you. He says things and the things that resonate with you show up- not because of anything he says or the way
that he says them but because they’re you, showing up. You can’t help it- you
want to, your conscious mind is fighting it and freaking out because that’s
kind of what humans do when faced with the truth but your subconscious, your
actual you, hears it and is encouraged by this acknowledgement so it decides to
assert it self a bit, nudge you a bit, and you respond because it’s you. It’s not him, it’s you- it isn’t the way that
he says it, it’s your response to it. It’s true, without his offering of these
things, your self wouldn’t have these things to respond to, but the response is
from you, the action is from you and other people are responding to different
things and taking action on different things because they have different
selves.
And so maybe that’s why zen tends to be so vague, so that it
can cast a broad enough net to offer something that lots of different selves
can respond to, that lots of different selves can feel seen by.
Part 1-The truth of your teacher (which, BTW, is you)
I was waiting to have lunch with a friend at the zen center when my teacher walked in to the building. I saw him from the corner of my eye and wasn't sure what to do. He came in the door, which was at the end of the hallway, and I was sitting on a bench, right next to the kitchen. So I could see him, but he was far away, and I never know what to do in that situation. Do you wave as soon as you see them? Because if you do, there's that awkward time when you've waved, and they're still walking toward you and what do you do, just keep staring at them? So, I just looked down and decided I would wait to wave hello until he came closer. As he approached, I looked up at him, smiled, and waved a silent wave of hello. He did nothing, just kept walking, until he was directly in front of me.
"Have they started serving lunch?" he asked, looking at me sitting on the bench, outside the kitchen, not actually in the kitchen, eating.
"Yes," I answered.
And then he paused.
And I think we looked at each other for a moment, and then he continued in to the kitchen.
I laughed at myself at this exchange- this simple answering of his question with absolutely no explanation for why I wasn't going in to the kitchen even though lunch was ready. My perception that there was a second question to his first: "Why are you sitting outside if lunch is ready?" yet my refusal to acknowledge this, to enter into any conversation beyond a direct answer to his question.
"Well," I thought to myself. "All he asked was if lunch was ready, all I did was answer, what's wrong with that?"
And then I thought about the fact that he hadn't waved back at me when I waved at him.
"Hmm," I wondered. "Was I supposed to bow to him? Did he not respond because I wasn't being formal enough for him? Was I being disrespectful to him by just smiling and waving hello?"
And then I thought, "Well, sorry, but all I'm doing is waiting for lunch with a friend and all I'm doing is waving hello to you. This is an improvement from what I've done in the past (which is an attempt to busy myself with something so that I don't have to make eye contact). It's true that I didn't say hello to you, but I was myself: I was kind of nervous but I was able to smile and wave. I'm kind of a smile and wave kind of person, so, accept that."
And then my friend showed up and we went and had lunch together.
But this interchange, between my teacher and me, kept popping in to my head. I kept hearing myself justifying my behavior, explaining it, making it acceptable. And I kept seeing myself, sitting on that bench with a sweet smile on my face and that quiet wave. Yet for all my justification of my behavior, something about it seemed in question to me. I just kept wondering why my teacher didn't wave back at me. At one point, when I was picturing myself on that bench, I saw myself as a little girl, smiling, and waving.
"Oh!" I thought. "I was being a little girl when I smiled and waved at him. I was being charming and innocent and cute. I wasn't being the same person who was able to look my teacher straight in the eye for all of my last dokusan with him, who stayed in the conversation when questions were asked, maintained eye contact, and gave answers without fear or apology."
"Oh!" I thought. "He didn't wave back because he wasn't accepting the little girl that I was showing him. He knew I was capable of being the confident 42 year old who sat dokusan with him last week. He knows I'm capable of saying hello to him, entering in to conversation with him, being a grownup with him. That's why he didn't wave back- he knew you could do better than that."
And I thought about how this incident had lingered in me, that it hadn't gone away. And I thought that the reason it had lingered there was because I hadn't seen the truth of it. It had kept coming up because I wasn't seeing it; but that my teacher's refusal to wave at me had created this question in me and in questioning it, I was able to finally see the truth of the matter: I am capable of an equal grownup social interchange with my teacher. I don't have to be a six year old anymore.
And I thought how skilled my teacher was, how he had paid such close attention to me and was really helping me to come out of my hiding and be myself. But then I thought about what he had said, and what he had done, and I gave myself a reality check:
Your teacher was walking to the kitchen for lunch. You were sitting outside the kitchen, not going in. He asked you if lunch was ready and you answered yes. Your teacher paused and then went to lunch. That's all, that's all that happened.
Who knows? Maybe he really did intend to not respond to your wave, maybe he really was encouraging you out of your shell; but probably, he was just going to lunch. You however, learned a lot about yourself in this interchange, you saw the truth of yourself in this interchange. Maybe it was him that pointed it out, maybe not, but you're the one who saw the truth- you're kind of the only one who can actually see you.
And so I think that your teacher really is just a mirror for you. When they're walking around, being themselves, you can see your reflection in them in the way that you interact with them. And, for me at least, in dokusan, my teacher asks questions or restates what I have shared with him in ways that make me later see things that I was unaware of or didn't want to see. I know my teacher is skilled at this. I can feel it in how what he says to me in dokusan pushes me to see things I wouldn't have seen on my own. But I also know that he's not inside my head after dokusan. The things that linger, the things that come up, those are my truths about me, they're me experiencing these truths and, when I'm willing, staying curious about them, letting them show themselves to me, and accepting them as part of who I am.
"Have they started serving lunch?" he asked, looking at me sitting on the bench, outside the kitchen, not actually in the kitchen, eating.
"Yes," I answered.
And then he paused.
And I think we looked at each other for a moment, and then he continued in to the kitchen.
I laughed at myself at this exchange- this simple answering of his question with absolutely no explanation for why I wasn't going in to the kitchen even though lunch was ready. My perception that there was a second question to his first: "Why are you sitting outside if lunch is ready?" yet my refusal to acknowledge this, to enter into any conversation beyond a direct answer to his question.
"Well," I thought to myself. "All he asked was if lunch was ready, all I did was answer, what's wrong with that?"
And then I thought about the fact that he hadn't waved back at me when I waved at him.
"Hmm," I wondered. "Was I supposed to bow to him? Did he not respond because I wasn't being formal enough for him? Was I being disrespectful to him by just smiling and waving hello?"
And then I thought, "Well, sorry, but all I'm doing is waiting for lunch with a friend and all I'm doing is waving hello to you. This is an improvement from what I've done in the past (which is an attempt to busy myself with something so that I don't have to make eye contact). It's true that I didn't say hello to you, but I was myself: I was kind of nervous but I was able to smile and wave. I'm kind of a smile and wave kind of person, so, accept that."
And then my friend showed up and we went and had lunch together.
But this interchange, between my teacher and me, kept popping in to my head. I kept hearing myself justifying my behavior, explaining it, making it acceptable. And I kept seeing myself, sitting on that bench with a sweet smile on my face and that quiet wave. Yet for all my justification of my behavior, something about it seemed in question to me. I just kept wondering why my teacher didn't wave back at me. At one point, when I was picturing myself on that bench, I saw myself as a little girl, smiling, and waving.
"Oh!" I thought. "I was being a little girl when I smiled and waved at him. I was being charming and innocent and cute. I wasn't being the same person who was able to look my teacher straight in the eye for all of my last dokusan with him, who stayed in the conversation when questions were asked, maintained eye contact, and gave answers without fear or apology."
"Oh!" I thought. "He didn't wave back because he wasn't accepting the little girl that I was showing him. He knew I was capable of being the confident 42 year old who sat dokusan with him last week. He knows I'm capable of saying hello to him, entering in to conversation with him, being a grownup with him. That's why he didn't wave back- he knew you could do better than that."
And I thought about how this incident had lingered in me, that it hadn't gone away. And I thought that the reason it had lingered there was because I hadn't seen the truth of it. It had kept coming up because I wasn't seeing it; but that my teacher's refusal to wave at me had created this question in me and in questioning it, I was able to finally see the truth of the matter: I am capable of an equal grownup social interchange with my teacher. I don't have to be a six year old anymore.
And I thought how skilled my teacher was, how he had paid such close attention to me and was really helping me to come out of my hiding and be myself. But then I thought about what he had said, and what he had done, and I gave myself a reality check:
Your teacher was walking to the kitchen for lunch. You were sitting outside the kitchen, not going in. He asked you if lunch was ready and you answered yes. Your teacher paused and then went to lunch. That's all, that's all that happened.
Who knows? Maybe he really did intend to not respond to your wave, maybe he really was encouraging you out of your shell; but probably, he was just going to lunch. You however, learned a lot about yourself in this interchange, you saw the truth of yourself in this interchange. Maybe it was him that pointed it out, maybe not, but you're the one who saw the truth- you're kind of the only one who can actually see you.
And so I think that your teacher really is just a mirror for you. When they're walking around, being themselves, you can see your reflection in them in the way that you interact with them. And, for me at least, in dokusan, my teacher asks questions or restates what I have shared with him in ways that make me later see things that I was unaware of or didn't want to see. I know my teacher is skilled at this. I can feel it in how what he says to me in dokusan pushes me to see things I wouldn't have seen on my own. But I also know that he's not inside my head after dokusan. The things that linger, the things that come up, those are my truths about me, they're me experiencing these truths and, when I'm willing, staying curious about them, letting them show themselves to me, and accepting them as part of who I am.
Post dokusan regrets and giddiness
As soon as I walked out of the building after meeting with Paul I literally said to myself, "Holy s@#! what have you just done?"
You just asked the former abbot of the zen center to be your teacher. I get why you did it. It seemed like a really good idea when he said that you would discuss your practice and how it plays out in your life. 'Yay you' for being in the moment and doing what you thought was a good idea at the time. But now you're in this moment. You are his student and he is your teacher... from now on.
"I don't think this was a very good idea," I thought to myself.
Then I reassured myself. I knew that if I really wanted to, I could always say, "This isn't working for me. I don't think I want to be a student anymore." And I was pretty sure that Paul would just say "Okay," and that would be the end of it. But I was also really terrified because I thought that I was a "student" now. I didn't know what that meant but it scared me.
As I turned the corner and walked past the front steps of the building, I had to laugh at myself.
"Remember when you were afraid to even come in to the building? Remember how much you wanted to be a part of the community but you couldn't seem to let yourself be a part of it because you were so afraid of what that meant?
This morning, you asked to be a student. That's really funny."
As I rode home I thought about writing a blogpost about what had happened: how I had made a decision in the moment that I ended up having to live in forever after. I also pictured myself telling people about it after the dharma talk that afternoon: how I went in to dokusan with absolutely no intention of being a student and walked out with a bunch of lessons and even some homework. I really thought that this was a decision that I had made in the moment and that I was going to regret because I thought I was stuck, that I was now at the mercy of whatever Paul had in mind for me as his student. I thought that I might end up doing all the things that I didn't think I needed to do: reading, studying, being a "student" at the zen center.
But I have to tell you that as soon as I got home, I told my room mate all about it, and with a big smile. I was giddy with the experience. When I got to the dharma talk that morning, I eagerly grabbed a zafu so that I could sit zazen during the talk, just so I could practice the posture and breathing that Paul and I had talked about that morning. And after the dharma talk, the first thing I said to anyone I knew was: I asked Paul to be my teacher this morning!
I have no idea why I wanted to tell everyone. No one was as giddy about it as I was and this surprised me. I thought that other people who had a teacher would say things like, "I remember when I first asked my teacher to be my teacher," but no one offered this. Honestly, it doesn't make sense that I'm so giddy about it, I'm not looking forward to my next dokusan, I don't feel like there's some change in my practice or anything but I'm also not feeling regret. I'm just feeling happy.
You just asked the former abbot of the zen center to be your teacher. I get why you did it. It seemed like a really good idea when he said that you would discuss your practice and how it plays out in your life. 'Yay you' for being in the moment and doing what you thought was a good idea at the time. But now you're in this moment. You are his student and he is your teacher... from now on.
"I don't think this was a very good idea," I thought to myself.
Then I reassured myself. I knew that if I really wanted to, I could always say, "This isn't working for me. I don't think I want to be a student anymore." And I was pretty sure that Paul would just say "Okay," and that would be the end of it. But I was also really terrified because I thought that I was a "student" now. I didn't know what that meant but it scared me.
As I turned the corner and walked past the front steps of the building, I had to laugh at myself.
"Remember when you were afraid to even come in to the building? Remember how much you wanted to be a part of the community but you couldn't seem to let yourself be a part of it because you were so afraid of what that meant?
This morning, you asked to be a student. That's really funny."
As I rode home I thought about writing a blogpost about what had happened: how I had made a decision in the moment that I ended up having to live in forever after. I also pictured myself telling people about it after the dharma talk that afternoon: how I went in to dokusan with absolutely no intention of being a student and walked out with a bunch of lessons and even some homework. I really thought that this was a decision that I had made in the moment and that I was going to regret because I thought I was stuck, that I was now at the mercy of whatever Paul had in mind for me as his student. I thought that I might end up doing all the things that I didn't think I needed to do: reading, studying, being a "student" at the zen center.
But I have to tell you that as soon as I got home, I told my room mate all about it, and with a big smile. I was giddy with the experience. When I got to the dharma talk that morning, I eagerly grabbed a zafu so that I could sit zazen during the talk, just so I could practice the posture and breathing that Paul and I had talked about that morning. And after the dharma talk, the first thing I said to anyone I knew was: I asked Paul to be my teacher this morning!
I have no idea why I wanted to tell everyone. No one was as giddy about it as I was and this surprised me. I thought that other people who had a teacher would say things like, "I remember when I first asked my teacher to be my teacher," but no one offered this. Honestly, it doesn't make sense that I'm so giddy about it, I'm not looking forward to my next dokusan, I don't feel like there's some change in my practice or anything but I'm also not feeling regret. I'm just feeling happy.
Requesting a teacher
Earlier this summer I had a BIG LIFE QUESTION that I just couldn't seem to answer on my own. So, I requested dokusan with Paul. Unfortunately, it was right before he left on a trip, so his assistant let me know that I probably wouldn't be able to meet with him for a while and that she would let me know when he would be available.
In the meantime, I came up with my own ideas about the big life question and felt like I didn't need to ask it anymore. So I was a little worried about what I would ask Paul when I finally met with him. But then, a couple of weeks later, I realized that I had a question for Paul: I wanted to ask him what it would mean to be a student.
I had considered asking Paul to be my teacher for quite some time but was never really firm in this request. There were times where it felt really appropriate to ask him to be my teacher, but I couldn't find a chance to ask him. And then there were other times where I had a chance to ask him, but it didn't feel right at that moment. So I hadn't asked him and wasn't really sure if I wanted to. I knew that if I did ask him to be my teacher, I wanted to know what I was getting in to. I felt like I was entering in to a relationship with him, one that he would be present and committed to. I wanted to know what my responsibilities would be, so that I would know whether or not I could uphold them. The last thing I wanted to do was to ask for something that I didn't want or couldn't do, especially if it involved someone else willingly doing it with me.
By the time I was scheduled to have dokusan with Paul, I had come up with my own ideas about what it would mean to be a student. I had decided that when I asked him, he would say that I would be reading texts and that he would be giving me koans. So then I decided that I would ask him a second question: Why would you do that? Why would you read books and think about stuff when really, it was more about sitting zazen and putting practice in your every day life?
Before I even got to dokusan with Paul, I had kind of decided that I didn't really want to be a student. I concluded that it wasn't where I was in my practice right now. I felt like I didn't need to read books or live in monastery, I just needed to sit zazen more and attend service. I was feeling like I was different from what I perceived the residents and practitioners at the zen center were. I felt like they studying Buddhism in order to become Buddhists or monks or practitioners. I felt like I was just sitting zazen to become a better teacher, to learn about myself, to untangle the knots in my core that had been tied so long ago.
As I sat in the dokusan waiting area, I imagined myself explaining this to Paul and having him agree with me: a student path isn't the one that you're on. You have your own path and you should come to the zen center to get what you need to sustain your journey on that path. As I was imagining this, Paul actually rang the bell that meant, "I'm free to meet with you." So I rang back, and entered the dokusan room. I did my prostrations, sat in front of him, and asked: "What does it mean to be a student? What would that involve?"
He asked for clarification, "What would it mean to be a student in general or what would it mean to be my student?"
I looked away and thought about this: What did I want to know?
I realized that what I really wanted to know was what it would mean to be his student, not just a student in general, so I looked back at him and said that.
I can't recall his exact words but what I remember was something like: "It would mean that we would talk about your practice and how it plays out in your life. We may talk about your posture, we may talk about your practice, we may talk about how it manifests in your everyday life..."
I looked away again.
"Oh!" I thought. "That would be really helpful. It would be really nice to have someone to talk to about what I'm doing in the classroom and how I can be more present to the kids. It would be really beneficial to everyone involved if Paul were included in this equation, if I had the support of his life experience and the wisdom of his teachings. That seems like a really appropriate thing for me to be doing with my time."
So I looked back at him and I said, "Can I ask you to be my teacher?"
"Yes," he said.
And then I realized that I didn't really ask him to be my teacher, I just asked him if I could ask him to be my teacher so I asked, "Will you be my teacher?"
And he answered, "Yes."
In the meantime, I came up with my own ideas about the big life question and felt like I didn't need to ask it anymore. So I was a little worried about what I would ask Paul when I finally met with him. But then, a couple of weeks later, I realized that I had a question for Paul: I wanted to ask him what it would mean to be a student.
I had considered asking Paul to be my teacher for quite some time but was never really firm in this request. There were times where it felt really appropriate to ask him to be my teacher, but I couldn't find a chance to ask him. And then there were other times where I had a chance to ask him, but it didn't feel right at that moment. So I hadn't asked him and wasn't really sure if I wanted to. I knew that if I did ask him to be my teacher, I wanted to know what I was getting in to. I felt like I was entering in to a relationship with him, one that he would be present and committed to. I wanted to know what my responsibilities would be, so that I would know whether or not I could uphold them. The last thing I wanted to do was to ask for something that I didn't want or couldn't do, especially if it involved someone else willingly doing it with me.
By the time I was scheduled to have dokusan with Paul, I had come up with my own ideas about what it would mean to be a student. I had decided that when I asked him, he would say that I would be reading texts and that he would be giving me koans. So then I decided that I would ask him a second question: Why would you do that? Why would you read books and think about stuff when really, it was more about sitting zazen and putting practice in your every day life?
Before I even got to dokusan with Paul, I had kind of decided that I didn't really want to be a student. I concluded that it wasn't where I was in my practice right now. I felt like I didn't need to read books or live in monastery, I just needed to sit zazen more and attend service. I was feeling like I was different from what I perceived the residents and practitioners at the zen center were. I felt like they studying Buddhism in order to become Buddhists or monks or practitioners. I felt like I was just sitting zazen to become a better teacher, to learn about myself, to untangle the knots in my core that had been tied so long ago.
As I sat in the dokusan waiting area, I imagined myself explaining this to Paul and having him agree with me: a student path isn't the one that you're on. You have your own path and you should come to the zen center to get what you need to sustain your journey on that path. As I was imagining this, Paul actually rang the bell that meant, "I'm free to meet with you." So I rang back, and entered the dokusan room. I did my prostrations, sat in front of him, and asked: "What does it mean to be a student? What would that involve?"
He asked for clarification, "What would it mean to be a student in general or what would it mean to be my student?"
I looked away and thought about this: What did I want to know?
I realized that what I really wanted to know was what it would mean to be his student, not just a student in general, so I looked back at him and said that.
I can't recall his exact words but what I remember was something like: "It would mean that we would talk about your practice and how it plays out in your life. We may talk about your posture, we may talk about your practice, we may talk about how it manifests in your everyday life..."
I looked away again.
"Oh!" I thought. "That would be really helpful. It would be really nice to have someone to talk to about what I'm doing in the classroom and how I can be more present to the kids. It would be really beneficial to everyone involved if Paul were included in this equation, if I had the support of his life experience and the wisdom of his teachings. That seems like a really appropriate thing for me to be doing with my time."
So I looked back at him and I said, "Can I ask you to be my teacher?"
"Yes," he said.
And then I realized that I didn't really ask him to be my teacher, I just asked him if I could ask him to be my teacher so I asked, "Will you be my teacher?"
And he answered, "Yes."
Sunday, October 7, 2018
DT renunciation
I'd like to talk about renunciation: giving stuff up, removing oneself from one's worldly possessions... that apparently moral high ground in which someone gives up all their worldly possessions and lives a life of austerity/ poverty but is somehow happy about it.
I'd like you to know that it's not what it seems.
And I'd like to demonstrate this... with a sweatshirt.
When I was in college, I dated a guy who had rowed for the U.C. Berkeley crew team. I was rowing for the U.C. Davis crew team at the time and one Saturday, he gave me his old sweatshirt.
I'm sure that for him it was just a sweatshirt but for me it was like getting your boyfriend's varsity letterman's jacket in high school. I slept with that sweatshirt, refused to wash it for as long as I could so that his smell would stay on it, and kept it neatly folded beneath my pillow during the day so that I could be certain it would be there when I returned at night. That sweatshirt was proof that someone cared about me, loved me, that I was cherished.
Then we broke up.
The breakup wasn't exactly harmonious but since I was the one who initiated it I couldn't really complain.
The sweatshirt, however, was banished. I threw it into the darkest corner of my closet, hoping that I would never have to deal with it again. That sweatshirt was proof that I had broken someone's heart, that I was incapable of love, that even when I thought I had found a life partner I had been wrong and it was me who had done it.
I wanted nothing to do with that sweatshirt. The only reason I kept it was because I didn't have the heart to mail it back to him and couldn't bear the thought of contacting him to return it.
Same sweatshirt, same grey cotton fabric, same navy blue letters...
different story.
And for me, this is what renunciation is about: same object, different story.
If you had asked me to give up that sweatshirt when we first started dating I would have refused. I would have clung it to my chest and told you that I couldn't live without it- it was mine and he had given it to me and there was no way I was giving it up.
If you had asked me to give up that sweatshirt after we broke up I would have giddily pointed out its hiding spot in the corner of my closet and skipped along as I walked you to to the door to take it away. Giving up that sweatshirt would have given me pure joy.
Now, I'm not saying that giving up your worldly possessions is going to give you pure joy but I am saying that once you start seeing your stories about things, giving stuff up is a walk in the park.
For this demonstration I will be using cars- a Tesla to be exact.
When I say the word Tesla, many of you will have a story about it. Here are some of mine:
eighty-two thousand dollars
environmentally conscious
Something I will never have
If your story of owning a Tesla is a sign of your financial success, giving it up could be difficult.
If your story of owning a Tesla is proof that you are environmentally conscious, you probably wouldn't want to trade it in for some other vehicle.
If your story of owning a Tesla is that you finally have something you never thought you could and someone asked you to give it up you might not want to do that.
But I think we are all in agreement that a Tesla is, in all truth, steel, rubber, leather (if you paid for it), and chemicals in the form of a battery. That's really all it is.
It's true, it may be the way you get to work, pick up your kids, get around town, but you can do that in other ways and the Tesla is made of the same materials as those other forms of transportation. So when you look at the Tesla for what it really is, you could probably give it up for some other form of transportation. You don't have to but it's definitely easier when you look at it that way.
And now I am going to push you a little more. I am going to ask you to consider a house.
If you are lucky, you live somewhere. Hopefully it is a place that you can come home to, reliably, each night.
Perhaps it is an apartment, a house, a condo, a mansion- more rooms than you need, just enough, or never enough at all.
Imagine I asked you to give that up. That would be crazy- it would be stupid, everyone needs a home. And it's true, everyone does need a home.
But most homes are made of wood, or brick, or some kind of other natural element. These elements are susceptible to things like fire, earthquakes, and floods. They can be ruined in an instant. We don't like to admit this. We want to believe that they are permanent, that they are safe, that they will always be there. But in truth, they are not. Homes offer us the promise of security but we know that this will not always be fulfilled.
You don't want to give up your home but when a disaster occurs and you are forced to give up your home you find that what you really need is a place of shelter, a place of safety, and what it looks like, what amenities it has are not as important as its basic offer of a place to call home.
In my experience, zen practice is about noticing yourself- what stories you bring to situations, how you approach life, how your stories have brought you to see the world in certain ways, and how they continue to shape how you see things. As you notice these stories you begin to see that they are stories, that you made them up, that though they often define how you see things they are actually just stories and you have a choice to see them as just that and, if you want, let them go and see things as they are instead.
I think that when monks start giving up their worldly possessions they're doing this because they've given up their stories about them.
Giving up the cool t-shirt they got at that amazing concert in the middle of the summer with their first love isn't what they're doing. They're giving up a piece of cotton in the shape of the letter T.
They're not giving up the BMW or Porsche or Prius that guaranteed the perception of them as capable members of society. They're walking away from a large object made of steel and rubber that burns gasoline.
In packing up their sunny apartment with their own room and that window they aren't leaving behind a home. They're simply moving from one place of shelter to another.
I say this not to make it look easy because it isn't.
I say this to point out that when people do this, when they "renounce" material possessions they are doing just that: they are RE announcing them for what they are: fabric, metal, wood. They aren't giving anything up at that point, what they had no longer has meaning so walking away from it is a whole different story.
I'm not saying you should start renouncing your material possessions but it you find that you really need something, that you are clinging to its meaning the way I was clinging to that sweatshirt and you find that this is causing you sorrow or pain, maybe look at the stories you have around it, maybe see it for what it is- it might actually free you from it (or him or her), enough to begin to walk away.
I'd like you to know that it's not what it seems.
And I'd like to demonstrate this... with a sweatshirt.
When I was in college, I dated a guy who had rowed for the U.C. Berkeley crew team. I was rowing for the U.C. Davis crew team at the time and one Saturday, he gave me his old sweatshirt.
I'm sure that for him it was just a sweatshirt but for me it was like getting your boyfriend's varsity letterman's jacket in high school. I slept with that sweatshirt, refused to wash it for as long as I could so that his smell would stay on it, and kept it neatly folded beneath my pillow during the day so that I could be certain it would be there when I returned at night. That sweatshirt was proof that someone cared about me, loved me, that I was cherished.
Then we broke up.
The breakup wasn't exactly harmonious but since I was the one who initiated it I couldn't really complain.
The sweatshirt, however, was banished. I threw it into the darkest corner of my closet, hoping that I would never have to deal with it again. That sweatshirt was proof that I had broken someone's heart, that I was incapable of love, that even when I thought I had found a life partner I had been wrong and it was me who had done it.
I wanted nothing to do with that sweatshirt. The only reason I kept it was because I didn't have the heart to mail it back to him and couldn't bear the thought of contacting him to return it.
Same sweatshirt, same grey cotton fabric, same navy blue letters...
different story.
And for me, this is what renunciation is about: same object, different story.
If you had asked me to give up that sweatshirt when we first started dating I would have refused. I would have clung it to my chest and told you that I couldn't live without it- it was mine and he had given it to me and there was no way I was giving it up.
If you had asked me to give up that sweatshirt after we broke up I would have giddily pointed out its hiding spot in the corner of my closet and skipped along as I walked you to to the door to take it away. Giving up that sweatshirt would have given me pure joy.
Now, I'm not saying that giving up your worldly possessions is going to give you pure joy but I am saying that once you start seeing your stories about things, giving stuff up is a walk in the park.
For this demonstration I will be using cars- a Tesla to be exact.
When I say the word Tesla, many of you will have a story about it. Here are some of mine:
eighty-two thousand dollars
environmentally conscious
Something I will never have
If your story of owning a Tesla is a sign of your financial success, giving it up could be difficult.
If your story of owning a Tesla is proof that you are environmentally conscious, you probably wouldn't want to trade it in for some other vehicle.
If your story of owning a Tesla is that you finally have something you never thought you could and someone asked you to give it up you might not want to do that.
But I think we are all in agreement that a Tesla is, in all truth, steel, rubber, leather (if you paid for it), and chemicals in the form of a battery. That's really all it is.
It's true, it may be the way you get to work, pick up your kids, get around town, but you can do that in other ways and the Tesla is made of the same materials as those other forms of transportation. So when you look at the Tesla for what it really is, you could probably give it up for some other form of transportation. You don't have to but it's definitely easier when you look at it that way.
And now I am going to push you a little more. I am going to ask you to consider a house.
If you are lucky, you live somewhere. Hopefully it is a place that you can come home to, reliably, each night.
Perhaps it is an apartment, a house, a condo, a mansion- more rooms than you need, just enough, or never enough at all.
Imagine I asked you to give that up. That would be crazy- it would be stupid, everyone needs a home. And it's true, everyone does need a home.
But most homes are made of wood, or brick, or some kind of other natural element. These elements are susceptible to things like fire, earthquakes, and floods. They can be ruined in an instant. We don't like to admit this. We want to believe that they are permanent, that they are safe, that they will always be there. But in truth, they are not. Homes offer us the promise of security but we know that this will not always be fulfilled.
You don't want to give up your home but when a disaster occurs and you are forced to give up your home you find that what you really need is a place of shelter, a place of safety, and what it looks like, what amenities it has are not as important as its basic offer of a place to call home.
In my experience, zen practice is about noticing yourself- what stories you bring to situations, how you approach life, how your stories have brought you to see the world in certain ways, and how they continue to shape how you see things. As you notice these stories you begin to see that they are stories, that you made them up, that though they often define how you see things they are actually just stories and you have a choice to see them as just that and, if you want, let them go and see things as they are instead.
I think that when monks start giving up their worldly possessions they're doing this because they've given up their stories about them.
Giving up the cool t-shirt they got at that amazing concert in the middle of the summer with their first love isn't what they're doing. They're giving up a piece of cotton in the shape of the letter T.
They're not giving up the BMW or Porsche or Prius that guaranteed the perception of them as capable members of society. They're walking away from a large object made of steel and rubber that burns gasoline.
In packing up their sunny apartment with their own room and that window they aren't leaving behind a home. They're simply moving from one place of shelter to another.
I say this not to make it look easy because it isn't.
I say this to point out that when people do this, when they "renounce" material possessions they are doing just that: they are RE announcing them for what they are: fabric, metal, wood. They aren't giving anything up at that point, what they had no longer has meaning so walking away from it is a whole different story.
I'm not saying you should start renouncing your material possessions but it you find that you really need something, that you are clinging to its meaning the way I was clinging to that sweatshirt and you find that this is causing you sorrow or pain, maybe look at the stories you have around it, maybe see it for what it is- it might actually free you from it (or him or her), enough to begin to walk away.
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